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Damping of Tensor Modes in Cosmology

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arxiv astro-ph/0306304 v2 pith:L5UDVYJD submitted 2003-06-16 astro-ph gr-qchep-phhep-th

Damping of Tensor Modes in Cosmology

classification astro-ph gr-qchep-phhep-th
keywords tensorwavelengthsanisotropichorizonstresscorrelationcosmologicalenter
verification ladder T0 review T1 audit T2 compute T3 formal T4 reserved
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An analytic formula is given for the traceless transverse part of the anisotropic stress tensor due to free streaming neutrinos, and used to derive an integro-differential equation for the propagation of cosmological gravitational waves. The solution shows that anisotropic stress reduces the squared amplitude by 35.6 % for wavelengths that enter the horizon during the radiation-dominated phase, independent of any cosmological parameters. This decreases the tensor temperature and polarization correlation functions for these wavelengths by the same amount. The effect is less for wavelengths that enter the horizon at later times. At the longest wavelengths the decrease in the tensor correlation functions due to neutrino free streaming ranges from 10.7% for $\Omega_Mh^2=0.1$ to 9.0% for $\Omega_Mh^2=0.15$. An Appendix gives a general proof that tensor as well as scalar modes satisfy a conservation law for perturbations outside the horizon, even when the anisotropic stress tensor is not negligible.

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