Gravitational waves from asymmetric oscillon dynamics?

TL;DR

This paper critically re-evaluates claims that asymmetric oscillon dynamics produce detectable gravitational waves, revealing that previous results were numerical artifacts due to resolution issues in simulations.

Contribution

The study demonstrates the importance of convergence testing in lattice simulations and shows that earlier predicted gravitational wave signals are likely numerical artifacts.

Findings

High frequency peak is a numerical artifact

Resolution issues significantly affect simulation accuracy

Previous gravitational wave predictions from oscillons are unreliable

Abstract

It has been recently suggested that oscillons produced in the early universe from certain asymmetric potentials continue to emit gravitational waves for a number of $e$-folds of expansion after their formation, leading to potentially detectable gravitational wave signals. We revisit this claim by conducting a convergence study using graphics processing unit (GPU)-accelerated lattice simulations and show that numerical errors accumulated with time are significant in low-resolution scenarios, or in scenarios where the run-time causes the resolution to drop below the relevant scales in the problem. Our study determines that the dominant, growing high frequency peak of the gravitational wave signals in the fiducial "hill-top model" in [arXiv:1607.01314] is a numerical artifact. This finding prompts the need for a more careful analysis of the numerical validity of other similar results related to gravitational waves from oscillon dynamics.