blackboard

waynehu

Professor, Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics
University of Chicago

Group Contact CV SnapShots
CMB Introduction '96   Intermediate '01   Polarization Intro '01   Cosmic Symphony '04   Polarization Primer '97   Review '02   Power Animations   Lensing   Power Prehistory   Legacy Material '96   PhD Thesis '95 Baryon Acoustic Oscillations Cosmic Shear Clusters
Transfer Function WMAP Likelihood Reionization PPF for CAMB Halo Mass Conversion Cluster Abundance
Intro to Cosmology [243] Cosmology I [legacy 321] Cosmology II [321] Current Topics [282] Galaxies and Universe [242] Radiative Processes [305] Research Preparation [307] GR Perturbation Theory [408] CMB [448] Cosmic Acceleration [449]

Baryons and Inertia

Key Concepts

Baryons (or ordinary matter) load down the photon-baryon plasma and add inertial (and gravitational) mass to the oscillating system.

Their effect on the acoustic peaks is easy to understand.  Remember what happens when you add mass to a spring and let it fall in the gravitational field of the Earth.  With more mass loading the spring, it falls further before pulled back by the spring.  On the other hand, it rebounds to the same position it started from. 

Since the odd numbered (first, third, fifth...) acoustic peaks are associated with how far the plasma "falls" into gravitational potential wells (how much the plasma compresses), they are enhanced by an increase in the amount of baryons in the universe.   The even numbered peaks (second, fourth, sixth) are associated with how far the plasma "rebounds" (how much the plasma rarefies).  Thus with the addition of baryons the odd peaks are enhanced over the even peaks.  For example, baryons make the first acoustic peak much larger than the second.  The more baryons the more the second peak is relatively suppressed

 Next Page