Past exam of the particle Astrophysics course of the University of Cambridge / 2014 / Paper 1 / 2

For successive radial null rays from a comoving source, ${\int }_{t_1}^{t_0}cdt/R(t)$ equals the same spatial integral. Subtracting two nearby wavecrests gives $\delta t_0/R_0=\delta t_1/R_1$, hence the cosmological redshiftFor transparent propagation, photon energies are reduced by $1+z$ and arrival intervals increased by $1+z$. The observer-area sphere is $4\pi (R_{0}r{)}^2$, so the observed bolometric flux isThus the requested $D_L=(1+z)D$ uses $D=R_{0}r$, the present transverse proper/area distance. In a curved metric this is not the radial proper distance $R_0{\int }_0^{r}d{r}^{\prime }/\sqrt{1-K{r}^{\prime 2}}$; the two coincide for $K=0$. The source's unqualified “proper distance” needs this distinction.

Type Ia supernovae are standardizable candles: light-curve shape and colour calibrate their luminosity. Distant events are fainter, hence have larger inferred luminosity distances, than appropriate matter-only decelerating models predict. Their redshift–distance relation favours recent accelerated expansion. In general relativity, sufficiently negative pressure, $\rho +3P/c^2<0$, drives acceleration. Dust, evolution, calibration and selection are checked as possible systematics; a single faint supernova is not the argument.^[ref]

An independent complementary test combines the cosmic microwave background acoustic distance/near-flat geometry with matter-density and baryon acoustic oscillation constraints. Matter alone does not supply the required late-time expansion history; a dark-energy component fits the joint data. CMB geometry alone has curvature/expansion degeneracies and is not an assumption-free detection of a cosmological constant.^[ref]

In natural units $c=\hslash =1$, a regulated zero-point energy estimate isThe integral is ultraviolet divergent and requires renormalization; it is not a finite prediction from counting “virtual pairs.” An electroweak scale estimate gives $|{\rho }_{\mathrm{vac}}|\sim m_t^4=(174{)}^4\mathrm{Ge}{\mathrm{V}}^4\simeq 9.2\times 10^8\mathrm{Ge}{\mathrm{V}}^4$, or somewhat smaller with loop factors. Compared with $10^{-47}\mathrm{Ge}{\mathrm{V}}^4$ this is roughly $10^{56}$ too large.

The source's units are inconsistent: $10^{-47}\mathrm{Ge}{\mathrm{V}}^4$ is a vacuum energy density, whereas $8\pi G{\rho }_{\mathrm{vac}}$ has units $\mathrm{Ge}{\mathrm{V}}^2$. The comparison above consistently uses densities. Bare and quantum contributions must cancel to extraordinary accuracy if this naive scale estimate is representative: the cosmological constant problem. Its severity is not a measured value of an individual cutoff integral.