Causality, Randomness, and the Microwave Background
Abstract
Fluctuations in the cosmic microwave background (CMB) temperature are being studied with ever increasing precision. Two competing types of theories might describe the origins of these fluctuations: ``inflation'' and ``defects.'' Here we show how the differences between these two scenarios can give rise to striking signatures in the microwave fluctuations on small scales, assuming a standard recombination history. These should enable high resolution measurements of CMB anisotropies to distinguish between these two broad classes of theories, independent of the precise details of each.
- Publication:
-
Physical Review Letters
- Pub Date:
- February 1996
- DOI:
- 10.1103/PhysRevLett.76.1413
- arXiv:
- arXiv:astro-ph/9505030
- Bibcode:
- 1996PhRvL..76.1413A
- Keywords:
-
- Astrophysics
- E-Print:
- uuencoded tex file and 4 postscript figure files, 8 pages. Also available at http://euclid.tp.ph/Papers/index.html