Dark energy constraints in light of theoretical priors

Abstract

In order to derive model-independent observational bounds on dark energy/modified gravity theories, a typical approach is to constrain parametrised models intended to capture the space of dark energy theories. Here we investigate in detail the effect that the nature of these parametrisations can have, finding significant effects on the resulting cosmological dark energy constraints. In order to observationally distinguish well-motivated and physical parametrisations from unphysical ones, it is crucial to understand the theoretical priors that physical parametrisations place on the phenomenology of dark energy. To this end we discuss a range of theoretical priors that can be imposed on general dark energy parametrisations, and their effect on the constraints on the phenomenology of dynamical dark energy. More specifically, we investigate both the phenomenological $\{\mu ,\Sigma \}$ parametrisation as well as effective field theory (EFT) inspired approaches to model dark energy interactions. We compare the constraints obtained in both approaches for different phenomenological and theory-informed time-dependences for the underlying functional degrees of freedom, discuss the effects of priors derived from gravitational wave physics, and investigate the interplay between constraints on parameters constraining only the background evolution vs. parameters controlling linear perturbations.

21 pages + appendices and references, 26 figures. v2: typos corrected, references added. v3: added Fig. 18 showing constraints on expansion history with DESI DR2 BAO data assuming an EFTDE model, and a few clarifications; version accepted to JCAP

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