Searching for concentric low variance circles in the cosmic microwave background

TL;DR

This paper investigates claims of concentric low-variance circles in the CMB, confirming their presence in data but showing they are consistent with Gaussian simulations, thus not evidence for new physics.

Contribution

The study reproduces previous analyses and demonstrates that the claimed features are consistent with standard Gaussian CMB simulations, challenging their interpretation as evidence for new cosmological theories.

Findings

Features are present in both real and simulated data.

Features are consistent with Gaussian CMB predictions.

No evidence found for non-standard cosmological phenomena.

Abstract

In a recent paper, Gurzadyan & Penrose claim to have found directions in the sky around which there are multiple concentric sets of annuli with anomalously low variance in the cosmic microwave background (CMB). These features are presented as evidence for a particular theory of the pre-Big Bang Universe. We are able to reproduce the analysis these authors presented for data from the WMAP satellite and we confirm the existence of these apparently special directions in the newer Planck data. However, we also find that these features are present at the same level of abundance in simulated Gaussian CMB skies, i.e. they are entirely consistent with the predictions of the standard cosmological model.