Constraints on cosmological models and reconstructing the acceleration history of the Universe with gamma-ray burst distance indicators

Abstract

Gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) have been regarded as standard candles at very high redshift for cosmology research. We have proposed a new method to calibrate GRB distance indicators with Type Ia supernova (SNe Ia) data in a completely cosmology-independent way to avoid the circularity problem that had limited the direct use of GRBs to probe cosmology [N. Liang, W. K. Xiao, Y. Liu, and S. N. Zhang, Astrophys. J. 685, 354 (2008).]. In this paper, a simple method is provided to combine GRB data into the joint observational data analysis to constrain cosmological models; in this method those SNe Ia data points used for calibrating the GRB data are not used to avoid any correlation between them. We find that the $\ensuremath{\Lambda}\mathrm{CDM}$ model is consistent with the joint data in the $1\mathrm{\text{\ensuremath{-}}}\ensuremath{\sigma}$ confidence region, using the GRB data at high redshift calibrated with the interpolating method, the Constitution set of SNe Ia, the cosmic microwave background radiation from Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe five year observation, the baryonic acoustic oscillation from the spectroscopic Sloan Digital Sky Survey Data Release 7 galaxy sample, the x-ray baryon mass fraction in clusters of galaxies, and the observational Hubble parameter versus redshift data. Comparing to the joint constraints with GRBs and without GRBs, we find that the contribution of GRBs to the joint cosmological constraints is a slight shift in the confidence regions of cosmological parameters to better enclose the $\ensuremath{\Lambda}\mathrm{CDM}$ model. Finally, we reconstruct the acceleration history of the Universe up to $z>6$ with the distance moduli of SNe Ia and GRBs and find some features that deviate from the $\ensuremath{\Lambda}\mathrm{CDM}$ model and seem to favor oscillatory cosmology models; however, further investigations are needed to better understand the situation.