Cosmological evolution of cosmic string loops
Abstract
The existence of a scaling evolution for cosmic string loops in an expanding universe is demonstrated for the first time by means of numerical simulations. In contrast with what is usually assumed, this result does not rely on any gravitational back reaction effect and has been observed for loops as small as a few thousandths the size of the horizon. We give the energy and number densities of expected cosmic string loops in both the radiation and matter eras. Moreover, we quantify previous claims on the influence of the network initial conditions and the formation of numerically unresolved loops by showing that they only concern a transient relaxation regime. Some cosmological consequences are discussed.
Cite
@article{arxiv.astro-ph/0511646,
title = {Cosmological evolution of cosmic string loops},
author = {Christophe Ringeval and Mairi Sakellariadou and Francois Bouchet},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:astro-ph/0511646},
year = {2009}
}
Comments
12 pages, 4 figures, uses iopart. Improved statistics, numerical robustness discussed in details, references added, note added. Matches published version