Past exam of the cosmology course of the University of Oxford / 2025 / 3 / b / Solution

The four contributions have distinct physical origins. The intrinsic photon temperature perturbation is ${\delta }_{\gamma }/4$: a local blackbody radiation energy density satisfies ${\rho }_{\gamma }\propto T^4$, so its first-order fractional perturbation is four times the fractional temperature perturbation. The endpoint cosmological Newtonian potential term ${\psi }_{\ast }$ is the gravitational redshift between the emitting plasma and the observer; escaping a negative potential well lowers the measured photon energy. Together with the intrinsic contribution it produces the ordinary Sachs-Wolfe effect. The term $-\hat{\mathbf{n}}\cdot {\mathbf{v}}_{\ast }$ is the Doppler CMB anisotropy, caused by the plasma's line-of-sight peculiar velocity at last scattering, with the source's direction convention.

Finally, $2\int d\chi {\psi }^{\prime }$ is the Integrated Sachs-Wolfe effect. A photon passing through a static potential well gains energy on entry and loses it on exit, with no net shift. When the potential evolves while the photon crosses, the two shifts fail to cancel. The factor two is the sum of the temporal and spatial scalar-potential contributions when anisotropic stress is negligible, so the two potentials are equal. The prime is a partial derivative at fixed comoving coordinate; it is not the total derivative along the light ray.

For a low-cosmological redshift galaxy sample, the intrinsic, endpoint-potential and last-scattering Doppler CMB anisotropy terms are localized near $z\simeq 1100$, whereas the galaxy density contrast is measured much nearer us. In the Limber approximation their radial kernels have no overlap, so their leading cross correlations vanish. The late Integrated Sachs-Wolfe effect samples the same nearby evolving potentials as the galaxies, giving the desired late-time CMB-matter cross correlation. The early Integrated Sachs-Wolfe effect near matter-radiation equality is likewise radially separated.

This is the leading linear, separated-kernel description intended here. The primary Cosmic microwave background anisotropy and late density contrast share primordial initial conditions, so their exact large-angle correlation need not be identically zero outside the Limber approximation. Additional secondary effects, such as the Sunyaev-Zeldovich effect, can also correlate with galaxies in real maps; they are absent from the stipulated linear expression.