Breaking the Single Clock Symmetry: measuring single-field inflation non-Gaussian features

TL;DR

This paper investigates how additional cosmic components like baryons and neutrinos break the single-clock symmetry in inflation, affecting the interpretation of non-Gaussian features in cosmological surveys.

Contribution

It quantifies the scales at which single-clock symmetry is broken due to baryonic and neutrino effects, impacting inflationary non-Gaussianity analysis.

Findings

Single-clock symmetry is only valid on scales where baryonic, neutrino effects, or sound speed are negligible.

Breaking this symmetry affects the interpretation of local non-Gaussianities from single-field inflation.

The scales of symmetry breaking depend on cosmic epoch and Universe composition.

Abstract

The Universe is not just cold dark matter and dark energy, it also contains baryons, radiation and neutrinos. The presence of these components, beyond the pressure-less cold dark matter and the quasi-uniform dark energy ones, imply that the single clock assumption from inflation is no longer preserved. Here we quantify this effect and show that the single-clock symmetry is ensured only on scales where baryonic effects, neutrinos effects, or sound speed are zero. These scales depend on the cosmic epoch and the Universe composition. Hence for all use and purposes of interpreting state-of-the-art and possibly forthcoming surveys, in the accessible scales, single clock symmetry cannot be said to be satisfied. Breaking the single-clock symmetry has key consequences for the study of non-Gaussian features generated by pure single-field inflation which arise from non-linearities in the metric yielding non-Gaussianities of the local type: the $n_{s}-1$ and the relativistic $-5/3$ term.