Can topological defects mimic the BICEP2 B-mode signal?

Abstract

We show that the B-mode polarization signal detected at low multipoles by BICEP2 cannot be entirely due to topological defects. This would be incompatible with the high-multipole B-mode polarization data and also with existing temperature anisotropy data. Adding cosmic strings to a model with tensors, we find that B-modes on their own provide a comparable limit on the defects to that already coming from Planck satellite temperature data. We note that strings at this limit give a modest improvement to the best-fit of the B-mode data, at a somewhat lower tensor-to-scalar ratio of $r\simeq 0.15$.

3 pages, 4 figures; Minor changes, matches published version

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• B polarization of cosmic microwave background as a tracer of strings
• Cosmic microwave anisotropies from BPS semilocal strings
• Detecting and distinguishing topological defects in future data from the CMBPol satellite
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