We model the dark sector of the cosmic substratum by a viscous fluid with an equation of state p = −ζΘ, where Θ is the fluid-expansion scalar and ζ is the coefficient of bulk viscosity for which we assume a dependence ζ ∝ ρ ν on the energy density ρ. The homogeneous and isotropic background dynamics coincides with that of a generalized Chaplygin gas with equation of state p = −A/ρ α .The perturbation dynamics of the viscous model, however, is intrinsically non-adiabatic and qualitatively different from the Chaplygin-gas case. In particular, it avoids short-scale instabilities and/or oscillations which apparently have ruled out unified models of the Chaplygin-gas type. We calculate the matter power spectrum and demonstrate that the non-adiabatic model is compatible with the data from the 2dFGRS and the SDSS surveys. A χ 2 -analysis shows, that for certain parameter combinations the viscous-dark-fluid (VDF) model is well competitive with the ΛCDM model. These results indicate that non-adiabatic unified models can be seen as potential contenders for a General-Relativity-based description of the cosmic substratum. *

We investigate the cosmological perturbation dynamics for a universe consisting of pressureless baryonic matter and a viscous fluid, the latter representing a unified model of the dark sector. In the homogeneous and isotropic background the \textit{total} energy density of this mixture behaves as a generalized Chaplygin gas. The perturbations of this energy density are intrinsically non-adiabatic and source relative entropy perturbations. The resulting baryonic matter power spectrum is shown to be compatible with the 2dFGRS and SDSS (DR7) data. A joint statistical analysis, using also Hubble-function and supernovae Ia data, shows that, different from other studies, there exists a maximum in the probability distribution for a negative present value $q_0 \approx - 0.53$ of the deceleration parameter. Moreover, while previous descriptions on the basis of generalized Chaplygin gas models were incompatible with the matter power spectrum data since they required a much too large amount of pressureless matter, the unified model presented here favors a matter content that is of the order of the baryonic matter abundance suggested by big-bang nucleosynthesis.Comment: 19 pages, 6 figure

We investigate a spatially flat Friedmann-Lemaître-Robertson-Walker cosmology in which a decaying vacuum term causes matter production at late times. Assuming a decay proportional to the Hubble rate, the ratio of the background energy densities of dark matter and dark energy changes with the cosmic scale factor as a −3/2 . The intrinsically non-adiabatic two-component perturbation dynamics of this model is reduced to a single second-order equation. Perturbations of the vacuum term are shown to be negligible on scales that are relevant for structure formation. On larger scales, dark-energy perturbations give a somewhat higher contribution but remain always smaller than the dark-matter perturbations. * ICTP Associate Member.

Yes, but only for a parameter value that makes it almost coincide with the standard model. We reconsider the cosmological dynamics of a generalized Chaplygin gas (gCg) which is split into a cold dark matter (CDM) part and a dark energy (DE) component with constant equation of state. This model, which implies a specific interaction between CDM and DE, has a ΛCDM limit and provides the basis for studying deviations from the latter. Including matter and radiation, we use the (modified) CLASS code [1] to construct the CMB and matter power spectra in order to search for a gCg-based concordance model that is in agreement with the SNIa data from the JLA sample and with recent Planck data. The results reveal that the gCg parameter α is restricted to |α| 0.05, i.e., to values very close to the ΛCDM limit α = 0. This excludes, in particular, models in which DE decays linearly with the Hubble rate.

Several accurate analyses of the cosmic microwave background (CMB) temperature maps from the Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP) have revealed a set of anomalous results, at large angular scales, that appears inconsistent with the statistical isotropy expected in the concordance cosmological model cold dark matter. Because these anomalies seem to indicate a preferred direction in the space, here we investigate the signatures that a primordial magnetic field, possibly present in the photon-baryon fluid during the decoupling era, could have produced in the large-angle modes of the observed CMB temperature fluctuations maps. To study these imprints, we simulate Monte Carlo CMB maps, which are statistically anisotropic due to the correlations between CMB multipoles induced by the magnetic field. Our analyses reveal the presence of the north-south angular correlations asymmetry phenomenon in these Monte Carlo maps, and we use these information to establish the statistical significance of such phenomenon observed in WMAP maps. Moreover, because a magnetic field produces planarity in the low-order CMB multipoles, where the planes are perpendicular to the preferred direction defined by the magnetic field, we investigate the possibility that two CMB anomalous phenomena, namely the north-south asymmetry and the quadrupoleoctopole planes alignment, could have a common origin. Our results, for large angles, show that the correlations between low-order CMB multipoles introduced by a sufficiently intense magnetic field, can reproduce some of the large-angle anisotropic features mapped in WMAP data. We also reconfirm, at more than 95 per cent CL, the existence of a north-south power asymmetry in the WMAP 5-yr data.