Observational strategies for varying constants with ESPRESSO and ELT-HIRES
Abstract
The observational evidence for the acceleration of the universe demonstrates that canonical theories of cosmology and particle physics are incomplete, if not incorrect. Several few-sigma hints of new physics, discussed in this workshop, are arguably smoke without a smoking gun. Forthcoming high-resolution ultra-stable spectrographs will play a crucial role in this quest for new physics, by enabling a new generation of precision consistency tests. Here we focus on astrophysical tests of the stability of nature's fundamental couplings, discussing the improvements that can be expected with ESPRESSO and ELT-HIRES and their impact on fundamental cosmology. We find that the current E-ELT configuration has the potential to constrain dark energy more strongly than standard surveys with thousands of low-redshift () supernovas.
Keywords
Cite
@article{arxiv.1309.7770,
title = {Observational strategies for varying constants with ESPRESSO and ELT-HIRES},
author = {P. O. J. Pedrosa and A. C. O. Leite and C. J. A. P. Martins},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1309.7770},
year = {2013}
}
Comments
To appear in the Proceedings of the Sesto Conference on Varying Fundamental Constants and Dynamical Dark Energy (Sesto, Italy, July 8-13, 2013)