English

On the non-Gaussianity from Recombination

Astrophysics 2009-11-13 v3 General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology High Energy Physics - Phenomenology High Energy Physics - Theory

Abstract

The non-linear effects operating at the recombination epoch generate a non-Gaussian signal in the CMB anisotropies. Such a contribution is relevant because it represents a major part of the second-order radiation transfer function which must be determined in order to have a complete control of both the primordial and non-primordial part of non-Gaussianity in the CMB anisotropies. We provide an estimate of the level of non-Gaussianity in the CMB arising from the recombination epoch which shows up mainly in the equilateral configuration. We find that it causes a contamination to the possible measurement of the equilateral primordial bispectrum shifting the minimum detectable value of the non-Gaussian parameter f^equil_NL by Delta f^equil_NL= O(10) for an experiment like Planck.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.0811.4584,
  title  = {On the non-Gaussianity from Recombination},
  author = {Nicola Bartolo and Antonio Riotto},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:0811.4584},
  year   = {2009}
}

Comments

LaTeX file; 11 pages. v2: Typos corrected; references added; comments about the effective non-linearity parameter added in Sec. IV; comments added in the conclusions of Sec. IV. v3: References added; some clarifications added as footnotes 4 and 6, and in Sec. 3. Matches version accepted for publication in JCAP

R2 v1 2026-06-21T11:46:04.439Z