Hubble Flow Research Articles

Can late dark energy transitions raise the Hubble constant?

Late times dark energy transitions at redshifts $z \ll 0.1$ can raise the predicted value of the Hubble constant to the SH0ES value, $74.03\pm 1.42$ (km s$^{-1}$ Mpc$^{-1})$ or more, while providing an equally good fit as $\Lambda$CDM at $67.73 \pm 0.41$ to higher redshift data, in particular from the cosmic microwave background and baryon acoustic oscillations. These models however do not fully resolve the true source of tension between the distance ladder and high redshift observations: the local calibration of supernovae luminosities well out into the Hubble flow. When tested in this manner by transferring the SH0ES calibration to the Pantheon supernovae dataset, the ability of such transitions to raise the Hubble constant is reduced to $69.17 \pm 1.09$. Such an analysis should also be used when testing any dynamical dark energy model which can produce similarly fine features in redshift or local void models.

Normal modes of vibrations around Hubble flow in jellium

A macroscopic Coulomb system of identical charged particles with or without a compensating background charge can evolve maintaining spatial homogeneity and isotropy that mimic the cosmological evolution of a universe with repulsive gravity. Here we study dynamics of small perturbations on the background of the corresponding Hubble flow by analyzing its normal modes of vibrations. Arbitrary disturbance of the flow can be resolved into two electroacoustic, two vortical, and one entropic modes whose dynamics is investigated. Specifically, in the zero pressure or long-wavelength limits perturbations of density and velocity evolve in a manner that is independent of the form of the initial disturbance. The same conclusion applies to vortical perturbations of the velocity for arbitrary pressure while entropic perturbations are advected by the Hubble flow. Without the background charge the underlying Hubble flow describes a Coulomb explosion whose stability with respect to small disturbances is also demonstrated.

New Solutions of Viscous Relativistic Hydrodynamics

Relativistic hydrodynamics represents a powerful tool to investigate the time evolution of the strongly interacting quark gluon plasma created in ultrarelativistic heavy ion collisions. The equations are solved often numerically, and numerous analytic solutions also exist. However, the inclusion of viscous effects in exact, analytic solutions has received less attention. Here we utilize Hubble flow to investigate the role of bulk viscosity, and present different classes of exact, analytic solutions valid also in the presence of dissipative effects.

Cosmological Model Insensitivity of Local H0 from the Cepheid Distance Ladder

Abstract The observed tension (∼9% difference) between the local distance ladder measurement of the Hubble constant, H 0, and its value inferred from the cosmic microwave background could hint at new, exotic, cosmological physics. We test the impact of the assumption about the expansion history of the universe ( ) on the local distance ladder estimate of H 0. In the fiducial analysis, the Hubble flow Type Ia supernova (SN Ia) sample is truncated to z < 0.15, and the deceleration parameter (q 0) is fixed to −0.55. We create realistic simulations of the calibrator and Pantheon samples, and account for a full systematics covariance between these two sets. We fit several physically motivated dark-energy models, and derive combined constraints from calibrator and Pantheon SNe Ia and simultaneously infer H 0 and dark-energy properties. We find that the assumption on the dark-energy model does not significantly change the local distance ladder value of H 0, with a maximum difference (ΔH 0) between the inferred value for different models of 0.47 km , i.e., a 0.6% shift in H 0, significantly smaller than the observed tension. Additional freedom in the dark-energy models does not increase the error in the inferred value of H 0. Including systematics covariance between the calibrators, low-redshift SNe, and high-redshift SNe can induce small shifts in the inferred value for H 0. The SN Ia systematics in this study contribute ≲0.8% to the total uncertainty of H 0.

The Effect of Interplay between the Newtonian Gravitational Field and the Cosmological Expansion

We study the motion of a celestial body under the simultaneous effect of the Newtonian and cosmological fields. The resulting effect is not only interesting by itself, but it could also give a contribution to solving the well-known problem of galactic rotation curves without the assumption of the existence of dark matter. We assume that in the outer regions of galaxies the stars and the hydrogen clouds follow not only the geodesics of the central field, but also the Hubble flow. By a simple application of the classical kinematics of relative motions, we analyze the effects of the composition of these two motions, and we find an increase of the rotation speed with respect to the galactic center that could be the cause of the non-Newtonian behavior of the rotation curves.

Cosmographic analysis of redshift drift

Redshift drift is the phenomenon whereby the observed redshift between an emitter and observer comoving with the Hubble flow in an expanding FLRW universe will slowly evolve—on a timescale comparable to the Hubble time. There are nevertheless serious astrometric proposals for actually observing this effect. We shall however pursue a more abstract theoretical goal, and perform a general cosmographic analysis of this effect, eschewing (for now) dynamical considerations in favour of purely kinematic symmetry considerations and Taylor series expansions based on FLRW spacetimes. We shall develop various exact results and series expansions for the redshift drift (and its derivatives) in terms of the present day Hubble, deceleration, jerk, snap, crackle, and pop parameters, as well as the present day redshift of the source. In particular, potential observation of this redshift drift effect is intimately related to the universe exhibiting a nonzero deceleration parameter.

Quantum loop effects to the power spectrum of primordial perturbations during ultra slow-roll inflation

We examine the quantum loop effects on the single-field inflationary models in a spatially flat Friedmann-Robertson-Walker (FRW) cosmological space-time with a general self-interacting scalar field potential, which is modeled in terms of the Hubble flow parameters in the effective field theory approach. In particular, we focus on the scenarios in both slow-roll to ultra-slow-roll (SR-USR) and SR-USR-SR inflation, in which it is shown that density perturbations originated from quantum vacuum fluctuations can be enhanced at small-scales, and then potentially collapse into primordial black holes (PBHs). Here our estimates indicate significant one-loop corrections around the peak of the density power spectrum in both scenarios. The induced large quantum loop effects should be confirmed by a more formal quantum field theory, and, if so, should be treated in a self-consistent manner that will be discussed.

Swift UVOT grism observations of nearby Type Ia supernovae – II. Probing the progenitor metallicity of SNe Ia with ultraviolet spectra

ABSTRACT Ultraviolet (UV) observations of Type Ia supernovae (SNe Ia) are crucial for constraining the properties of their progenitor systems. Theoretical studies predicted that the UV spectra, which probe the outermost layers of an SN, should be sensitive to the metal content of the progenitor. Using the largest SN Ia UV (λ < 2900 Å) spectroscopic sample obtained from Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory, we investigate the dependence of UV spectra on metallicity. For the first time, our results reveal a correlation (∼2σ) between SN Ia UV flux and host-galaxy metallicities, with SNe in more metal-rich galaxies (which are likely to have higher progenitor metallicities) having lower UV flux level. We find that this metallicity effect is only significant at short wavelengths (λ ≲ 2700 Å), which agrees well with the theoretical predictions. We produce UV spectral templates for SNe Ia at peak brightness. With our sample, we could disentangle the effect of light-curve shape and metallicity on the UV spectra. We also examine the correlation between the UV spectra and SN luminosities as parametrized by Hubble residuals. However, we do not see a significant trend with Hubble residuals. This is probably due to the large uncertainties in SN distances, as the majority of our sample members are extremely nearby (redshift z ≲ 0.01). Future work with SNe discovered in the Hubble flow will be necessary to constrain a potential metallicity bias on SN Ia cosmology.

Scaling attractors in multi-field inflation

Multi-field inflation with a curved scalar geometry has been found to support background trajectories that violate the slow-roll, slow-turn conditions and thus have the potential to evade the swampland constraints. In order to understand how generic this novel behaviour is and what conditions lead to it, we perform a classification of dynamical attractors of two-field inflation that are of the scaling type. Scaling solutions form a one-parameter generalization of De Sitter solutions with a constant value of the first Hubble flow parameter ϵ and, as we argue and demonstrate, form a natural starting point for the study of non-slow-roll slow-turn behaviour. All scaling solutions can be classified as critical points of a specific dynamical system. We recover known multi-field inflationary attractors as approximate scaling solutions and classify their stability using dynamical system techniques. In particular, we discover that dynamical bifurcations play an integral role in the transition between geodesic and non-geodesic motion and discuss the ability of scaling solutions to describe realistic multi-field models. We revisit the criteria for background stability and show cases where the usual criteria found in the literature do not capture the background evolution of the system.

Connecting early and late epochs by f(z)CDM cosmography

The cosmographic approach is gaining considerable interest as a model-independent technique able to describe the late expansion of the universe. Indeed, given only the observational assumption of the cosmological principle, it allows to study the today observed accelerated evolution of the Hubble flow without assuming specific cosmological models. In general, cosmography is used to reconstruct the Hubble parameter as a function of the redshift, assuming an arbitrary fiducial value for the current matter density, Ωm, and analysing low redshift cosmological data. Here we propose a different strategy, linking together the parametric cosmographic behavior of the late universe expansion with the small scale universe. In this way, we do not need to assume any “a priori” values for the cosmological parameters, since these are constrained at early epochs using both the Cosmic Microwave Background Radiation (CMBR) and Baryonic Acoustic Oscillation (BAO) data. In other words, we want to develop a cosmographic approach without assuming any background model but considering a f(z)CDM model where the function f(z) is given by a suitable combination of polynomials capable of tracking the cosmic luminosity distance, replacing the cosmological constant Λ. In order to test this strategy, we describe the late expansion of the universe using the Pad'e polynomials. Specifically, we adopt a P(2,2) series, that is a promising rational series which guarantees a good convergence also at high redshift. This approach is discussed in the light of the recent H(z) values indicators, combined with Supernovae Pantheon sample, galaxy clustering and early universe data, as CMBR and BAO. We found an interesting dependence of the current matter density value with cosmographic parameters, proving the inaccuracy of setting the value of Ωm in cosmographic analyses. Furthermore, a non-negligible effect of the cosmographic parameters on the CMBR temperature anisotropy power spectrum is shown, and constraints by selected joint datasets are reported. Finally, we found that the cosmographic series, truncated at third order, shows a better χ2 best fit value then the vanilla ΛCDM model. This can be interpreted as the requirement that higher order corrections have to be considered to correctly describe low redshift data and remove the degeneration of the models.

Inflationary perturbation spectra at next-to-leading slow-roll order in effective field theory of inflation

The effective field theory (EFT) of inflation provides an essential picture to explore the effects of the unknown high energy physics in the single scalar field inflation models. For a generic EFT of inflation, possible high energy corrections to simple slow-roll inflation can modify both the propagating speed and dispersion relations of the cosmological scalar and tensor perturbations. With the arrival of the era of precision cosmology, it is expected that these high energy corrections become more important and have to be taken into account in the analysis with future precise observational data. In this paper we study the observational predictions of the EFT of inflation by using the third-order uniform asymptotic approximation method. We calculate explicitly the primordial power spectra, spectral indices, running of the spectral indices for both scalar and tensor perturbations, and the ratio between tensor and scalar spectra. These expressions are all written in terms of the Hubble flow parameters and the flow of four new slow-roll parameters and expanded up to the next-to-leading order in the slow-roll expansions so they represent the most accurate results obtained so far in the literature. The flow of the four new slow-roll parameters, which arise from the four new operators introduced in the action of the EFT of inflation, can affect the primordial perturbation spectra at the leading-order and the corresponding spectral indices at the next-to-leading order.

Discovery of intergalactic bridges connecting two faint z ∼ 3 quasars

We used the Multi-Unit Spectroscopic Explore (MUSE) on the Very Large Telescope (VLT) to conduct a survey of z ∼ 3 physical quasar pairs at close separation (<30″) with a fast observation strategy (45 min on source). Our aim is twofold: (i) to explore the Lyα glow around the faint-end of the quasar population; and (ii) to take advantage of the combined illumination of a quasar pair to unveil large-scale intergalactic structures (if any) extending between the two quasars. In this work we report the results for the quasar pair SDSS J113502.03−022110.9 – SDSS J113502.50−022120.1 (z = 3.020, 3.008; i = 21.84, 22.15), separated by 11.6″ (or 89 projected kpc). MUSE reveals filamentary Lyα structures extending between the two quasars with an average surface brightness of SBLyα = 1.8 × 10−18 erg s−1 cm−2 arcsec−2. Photoionization models of the constraints in the Lyα, He IIλ1640, and C IVλ1548 line emissions show that the emitting structures are intergalactic bridges with an extent between ∼89 kpc, the quasars’ projected distance, and up to ∼600 kpc. Our models rule out the possibility that the structure extends for ∼2.9 Mpc, that is, the separation inferred from the uncertain systemic redshift difference of the quasars if the difference was only due to the Hubble flow. At the current spatial resolution and surface brightness limit, the average projected width of an individual bridge is ∼35 kpc. We also detect one strong absorption in H I, N V, and C IV along the background sight-line at higher z, which we interpret to be due to at least two components of cool (T ∼ 104 K), metal enriched (Z > 0.3 Z⊙), and relatively ionized circumgalactic or intergalactic gas surrounding the quasar pair. Two additional H I absorbers are detected along both quasar sight-lines at ∼−900 and −2800 km s−1 from the system; the latter has associated C IV absorption only along the foreground quasar sight-line. The absence of galaxies in the MUSE field of view at the redshifts of these two absorbers suggests that they trace large-scale structures or expanding shells in front of the quasar pair. Combining longer exposures and higher spectral resolution when targeting similar quasar pairs has the potential to firmly constrain the physical properties of gas in large-scale intergalactic structures.

A Particle Emitting Source From an Accelerating, Perturbative Solution of Relativistic Hydrodynamics

The quark gluon plasma is formed in heavy-ion collisions, and it can be described by solutions of relativistic hydrodynamics. In this paper we utilize perturbative hydrodynamics, where we study first order perturbations on top of a known solution. We investigate the perturbations on top of the Hubble flow. From this perturbative solution we can give the form of the particle emitting source and calculate observables of heavy-ion collisions. We describe the source function and the single-particle momentum spectra for a spherically symmetric solution.

Cosmological perfect fluids in Gauss–Bonnet gravity

In a [Formula: see text]-dimensional Friedmann–Robertson–Walker metric, it is rigorously shown that any analytical theory of gravity [Formula: see text], where [Formula: see text] is the curvature scalar and [Formula: see text] is the Gauss–Bonnet topological invariant, can be associated to a perfect-fluid stress–energy tensor. In this perspective, dark components of the cosmological Hubble flow can be geometrically interpreted.

The Carnegie-Chicago Hubble Program. VIII. An Independent Determination of the Hubble Constant Based on the Tip of the Red Giant Branch*

Abstract We present a new and independent determination of the local value of the Hubble constant based on a calibration of the tip of the red giant branch (TRGB) applied to Type Ia supernovae (SNe Ia). We find a value of H 0 = 69.8 ± 0.8 (±1.1% stat) ± 1.7 (±2.4% sys) km s−1 Mpc−1. The TRGB method is both precise and accurate and is parallel to but independent of the Cepheid distance scale. Our value sits midway in the range defined by the current Hubble tension. It agrees at the 1.2σ level with that of the Planck Collaboration et al. estimate and at the 1.7σ level with the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) SHoES measurement of H 0 based on the Cepheid distance scale. The TRGB distances have been measured using deep HST Advanced Camera for Surveys imaging of galaxy halos. The zero-point of the TRGB calibration is set with a distance modulus to the Large Magellanic Cloud of 18.477 ± 0.004 (stat) ± 0.020 (sys) mag, based on measurement of 20 late-type detached eclipsing binary stars, combined with an HST parallax calibration of a 3.6 μm Cepheid Leavitt law based on Spitzer observations. We anchor the TRGB distances to galaxies that extend our measurement into the Hubble flow using the recently completed Carnegie Supernova Project I ( CSP-I ) sample containing about 100 well-observed SNe Ia . There are several advantages of halo TRGB distance measurements relative to Cepheid variables; these include low halo reddening, minimal effects of crowding or blending of the photometry, only a shallow (calibrated) sensitivity to metallicity in the I band, and no need for multiple epochs of observations or concerns of different slopes with period. In addition, the host masses of our TRGB host-galaxy sample are higher, on average, than those of the Cepheid sample, better matching the range of host-galaxy masses in the CSP-I distant sample and reducing potential systematic effects in the SNe Ia measurements.

Constraining cluster masses from the stacked phase space distribution at large radii

Abstract Velocity dispersions have been employed as a method to measure masses of clusters. To complement this conventional method, we explore the possibility of constraining cluster masses from the stacked phase space distribution of galaxies at larger radii, where infall velocities are expected to have a sensitivity to cluster masses. First, we construct a two-component model of the three-dimensional phase space distribution of haloes surrounding clusters up to 50 $\, h^{-1}$ Mpc from cluster centres based on N-body simulations. We confirm that the three-dimensional phase space distribution shows a clear cluster mass dependence up to the largest scale examined. We then calculate the probability distribution function of pairwise line-of-sight velocities between clusters and haloes by projecting the three-dimensional phase space distribution along the line of sight with the effect of the Hubble flow. We find that this projected phase space distribution, which can directly be compared with observations, shows a complex mass dependence due to the interplay between infall velocities and the Hubble flow. Using this model, we estimate the accuracy of dynamical mass measurements from the projected phase space distribution at the transverse distance from cluster centres larger than $2\, h^{-1}$ Mpc. We estimate that, by using 1.5 × 105 spectroscopic galaxies, we can constrain the mean cluster masses with an accuracy of 14.5 per cent if we fully take account of the systematic error coming from the inaccuracy of our model. This can be improved down to 5.7 per cent by improving the accuracy of the model.

Accurate method to determine the systematics due to the peculiar velocities of galaxies in measuring the Hubble constant from gravitational-wave standard sirens

We propose a novel approach to accurately pin down the systematics due to the peculiar velocities of galaxies in measuring the Hubble constant from nearby galaxies in current and future gravitational-wave (GW) standard-siren experiments. Given the precision that future GW standard-siren experiments aim to achieve, the peculiar velocities of nearby galaxies will be a major source of uncertainty. Unlike the conventional backward reconstruction that requires additional redshift-independent distance indicators to recover the peculiar velocity field, we forwardly model the peculiar velocity field by using a high-fidelity mock galaxy catalog built from high-resolution dark matter only (DMO) N-body simulations with a physically motivated subhalo abundance matching technique without introducing any free parameters. Our mock galaxy catalog can impressively well reproduce the observed spectroscopic redshift space distortions (RSDs) in highly non-linear regimes down to very small scales, which is a robust test of the velocity field of our mock galaxy catalog. Based on this mock galaxy catalog, we accurately, for the first time, measure the peculiar velocity probability distributions for the SDSS main galaxy samples. We find that the systematics induced by the peculiar velocities of SDSS like galaxies on the measured Hubble constant can be reduced to below $1\%$($1\sigma$) for GW host galaxies with a Hubble flow redshift just above $0.13$, a distance that can be well probed by future GW experiments and galaxy surveys.

Relation between the turnaround radius and virial mass in f(R) model

We investigate the relationship between the turnaround radius Rt and the virial mass Mv of cosmic structures in the context of ΛCDM model and in an f(R) model of modified gravity—namely, the Hu-Sawicki model. The turnaround radius is the distance from the center of the cosmic structure to the shell that is detaching from the Hubble flow at a given time, while the virial mass is defined, for this work, as the mass enclosed within the volume where the density is 200 times the background density. We employ a new approach by considering that, on average, gravitationally bound astrophysical systems (e.g., galaxies, groups and clusters of galaxies) follow, in their innermost region, a Navarro-Frenk-White density profile, while beyond the virial radius (Rv) the profile is well approximated by the 2-halo term of the matter correlation function. By combining these two properties together with the information drawn from solving the spherical collapse for the structures, we are able to connect two observables that can be readily measured in cosmic structures: the turnaround radius and the virial mass. In particular, we show that, in ΛCDM, the turnaround mass at z=0 is related to the virial mass of that same structure by Mt ≃ 3.07 Mv, while in terms of the radii we have that Rt ≃ 3.7 Rv (for virial masses of 1013 h−1 M⊙). In the f(R) model, on the other hand, we have Mt ≃ 3.43 Mv and Rt ≃ 4.1 Rv, for |fR0|=10−6 and the same mass scale. Therefore, the difference between ΛCDM and f(R) in terms of these observable relations is of order ∼ 10−20% even for a relatively mild strength of the modification of gravity (|fR0|=10−6). For the turnaround radius itself we find a difference of ∼ 9% between the weakly modification in gravity considered in this work (|fR0|=10−6) and ΛCDM for a mass of 1013 h−1 M⊙. Once observations allow precisions of this order or better in measurements of the turnaround Rt, as well as the virial mass Mv (and/or the virial radius Rv), these quantities will become powerful tests of modified gravity.

Extended gravity cosmography

Cosmography can be considered as a sort of a model-independent approach to tackle the dark energy/modified gravity problem. In this review, the success and the shortcomings of the [Formula: see text]CDM model, based on General Relativity (GR) and standard model of particles, are discussed in view of the most recent observational constraints. The motivations for considering extensions and modifications of GR are taken into account, with particular attention to [Formula: see text] and [Formula: see text] theories of gravity where dynamics is represented by curvature or torsion field, respectively. The features of [Formula: see text] models are explored in metric and Palatini formalisms. We discuss the connection between [Formula: see text] gravity and scalar–tensor theories highlighting the role of conformal transformations in the Einstein and Jordan frames. Cosmological dynamics of [Formula: see text] models is investigated through the corresponding viability criteria. Afterwards, the equivalent formulation of GR (Teleparallel Equivalent General Relativity (TEGR)) in terms of torsion and its extension to [Formula: see text] gravity is considered. Finally, the cosmographic method is adopted to break the degeneracy among dark energy models. A novel approach, built upon rational Padé and Chebyshev polynomials, is proposed to overcome limits of standard cosmography based on Taylor expansion. The approach provides accurate model-independent approximations of the Hubble flow. Numerical analyses, based on Monte Carlo Markov Chain integration of cosmic data, are presented to bound coefficients of the cosmographic series. These techniques are thus applied to reconstruct [Formula: see text] and [Formula: see text] functions and to frame the late-time expansion history of the universe with no a priori assumptions on its equation-of-state. A comparison between the [Formula: see text]CDM cosmological model with [Formula: see text] and [Formula: see text] models is reported.

Polarized Baryon Production in Heavy Ion Collisions: An Analytic Hydrodynamical Study

In this paper, we utilize known exact analytic solutions of perfect fluid hydrodynamics to analytically calculate the polarization of baryons produced in heavy-ion collisions. Assuming local thermodynamical equilibrium also for spin degrees of freedom, baryons get a net polarization at their formation (freeze-out). This polarization depends on the time evolution of the Quark-Gluon Plasma (QGP), which can be described as an almost perfect fluid. By using exact analytic solutions, we can thus analyze the necessity of rotation (and vorticity) for non-zero net polarization. In this paper, we give the first analytical calculations for the polarization four-vector. We use two hydrodynamical solutions; one is the spherically symmetric Hubble flow (a somewhat oversimplified model, to demonstrate the methodology); and the other solution is a somewhat more involved one that corresponds to a rotating and accelerating expansion, and is thus well-suited for the investigation of some of the main features of the time evolution of the QGP created in peripheral heavy-ion collisions (although there are still numerous features of real collision geometry that are beyond the scope of this simple model). Finally, we illustrate and discuss our results on the polarization.