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arxiv: 1405.7023 · v4 · pith:G2PUR3OPnew · submitted 2014-05-27 · 🌀 gr-qc · astro-ph.CO

Calculating the mass spectrum of primordial black holes

classification 🌀 gr-qc astro-ph.CO
keywords primordialblackholespbhscalculationeffectfindingindex
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We reinspect the calculation for the mass fraction of primordial black holes (PBHs) which are formed from primordial perturbations, finding that performing the calculation using the comoving curvature perturbation $\mathcal{R}_{c}$ in the standard way vastly overestimates the number of PBHs, by many orders of magnitude. This is because PBHs form shortly after horizon entry, meaning modes significantly larger than the PBH are unobservable and should not affect whether a PBH forms or not - this important effect is not taken into account by smoothing the distribution in the standard fashion. We discuss alternative methods and argue that the density contrast, $\Delta$, should be used instead as super-horizon modes are damped by a factor $k^{2}$. We make a comparison between using a Press-Schechter approach and peaks theory, finding that the two are in close agreement in the region of interest. We also investigate the effect of varying the spectral index, and the running of the spectral index, on the abundance of primordial black holes.

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Cited by 5 Pith papers

Reviewed papers in the Pith corpus that reference this work. Sorted by Pith novelty score.

  1. Opening the Window of Ultra-Light PBHs by Exorcising the Poltergeist

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  4. Primordial black holes in excursion set theory: Formation probabilities, mass functions, and window functions

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    In excursion set theory with colored noises, the low-mass tail of the PBH mass function differs from Carr's formula because correlated noises end the degeneracy of formation probabilities, though Carr's formula remain...

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