New constraints on varying alpha

• Type: Article in International Scientific Journal
• Date: 2003

Authors

rocha, g (Author) Other; trotta, r (Author) Other; martins, cjap (Author) Other; melchiorri, a (Author) Other; avelino, pp (Author) FCUP; viana, ptp (Author) FCUP

Journal

Title: New Astronomy Reviews

Vol. 47

Pages: 863-869

ISSN: 1387-6473

Publisher: Elsevier

Indexing

ISI Web of Knowledge - 27 Citations

Scopus - 25 Citations

Scientific classification

FOS: Natural sciences > Physical sciences

Other information

Authenticus ID: P-000-EPJ

DOI: 10.1016/j.newar.2003.07.018

Abstract (EN): We present a summary of recent constraints on the value of the fine-structure constant at the epoch of decoupling from the recent observations made by the Wilkinson microwave anisotropy probe (WMAP) satellite. Within the set of models considered, a variation of the value of alpha at decoupling with respect to the present-day value is now bounded to be smaller than 2% (6%) at 95% confidence level. We point out that the existence of an early reionization epoch as suggested by the above measurements will, when more accurate cosmic microwave background polarization data are available, lead to considerably tighter constraints. We find that the tightest possible constraint on alpha is about 0.1% using CMB data alone-tighter constraints will require further (non-CMB) priors.

Language: English

Type (Professor's evaluation): Scientific

No. of pages: 7