Signature of a Cosmic String Wake at $z=3$

TL;DR

This study uses high-resolution N-body simulations to detect cosmic string wakes at redshift 3, demonstrating that such wakes can be statistically distinguished from standard cosmological fluctuations.

Contribution

The paper introduces a new simulation approach with higher resolution and lower redshift insertion to better identify cosmic string wakes in dark matter maps.

Findings

Wake detection at 3-sigma confidence level

Effective curvelet analysis method

Detectability down to redshift z=3

Abstract

In this paper, we describe the results of N-body simulation runs, which include a cosmic string wake of tension $G\mu= 4 \times 10^{-8}$ on top of the usual $\Lambda CDM$ fluctuations. To obtain a higher resolution of the wake in the simulations compared to previous work, we insert the effects of the string wake at a lower redshift and perform the simulations in a smaller volume. A curvelet analysis of the wake and no-wake maps is applied, indicating that the presence of a wake can be extracted at a three-sigma confidence level from maps of the two-dimensional dark matter projection down to a redshift of $z=3$.