Anisotropic LRS-BI Universe with $f(Q)$ gravity theory

The possible anisotropic nature in the early phases of the Universe is one of the interesting aspects of study in cosmology. We investigate the evolution of the Universe in terms of few cosmological parameters considering an anisotropic locally rotationally symmetric (LRS) Bianchi type-I spacetime (LRS-BI) under the $f(Q)$ gravity of symmetric teleparallel theory equivalent to the GR (STEGR). In this study we consider two $f(Q)$ gravity models, viz., $f(Q) = -\,(Q+2\Lambda)$, a simple model with the cosmological constant $\Lambda$ and the power law model, $f(Q) = -\, \alpha Q^n$ with two constant parameters $\alpha$ and $n$. Considering a proportionality relation between the directional Hubble parameters with a proportionality constant parameter $\lambda$ we find a significant contribution of the anisotropic factor in the evolution of the early Universe for both models. The power law model shows the more dominating effect of anisotropy in comparison to the simple model depending on model parameters, especially on the parameter $n$. The power law model also shows some possible effects of anisotropy on the Universe's evolution in the near future. In addition, both models confirm that the anisotropy does not obtain any appreciable signature in the current stage of the Universe. From our analysis we also set rough constraints on our model parameters as $0.5 \le \lambda \le 1.25$, $0.75 \le \alpha \le 1.5$ and $0.95 \le n \le 1.05$.