The Hubble diagram as a probe of mini-charged particles

Abstract

The luminosity-redshift relation of cosmological standard candles provides information about the relative energy composition of our Universe. In particular, the observation of type Ia supernovae up to redshift of z~2 indicate a universe which is dominated today by dark matter and dark energy. The propagation distance of light from these sources is of the order of the Hubble radius and serves as a very sensitive probe of feeble inelastic photon interactions with background matter, radiation or magnetic fields. In this paper we discuss the limits on mini-charged particle models arising from a dimming effect in supernova surveys. We briefly speculate about a strong dimming effect as an alternative to dark energy.

4 pages, 3 figures