Inhomogeneous and interacting vacuum energy

Abstract

Vacuum energy is a simple model for dark energy driving an accelerated expansion of the universe. If the vacuum energy is inhomogeneous in spacetime then it must be interacting. We present the general equations for a spacetime-dependent vacuum energy in cosmology, including inhomogeneous perturbations. We show how any dark energy cosmology can be described by an interacting vacuum+matter. Different models for the interaction can lead to different behaviour (e.g., sound speed for dark energy perturbations) and hence could be distinguished by cosmological observations. As an example we present the cosmic microwave microwave background anisotropies and the matter power spectrum for two different versions of a generalised Chaplygin gas cosmology.

10 pages, 5 figures; to appear in the proceedings of IV International Meeting on Gravitation and Cosmology, Guadalajara, May 2012

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Cited by in corpus (5)

• Indications of a late-time interaction in the dark sector
• Constraints on a decomposed dark fluid with constant adiabatic sound speed by jointing the geometry test and growth rate after Planck data
• Interacting dark energy after DESI DR2: a challenge for $\Lambda$CDM paradigm?
• Perturbations in the interacting vacuum
• Phase space analysis and cosmography of a two-fluid cosmological model