Is There Evidence for Cosmic Anisotropy in the Polarization of Distant Radio Sources?

1997/04/29 by Sean M. Carroll, George B. Field · 9 citations
Physics and Astronomy · #Anisotropy #Astronomy #Astrophysics #Astrophysics and Cosmic Phenomena #COSMIC cancer database #Cosmic microwave background #Cosmology #Cosmology and Gravitation Theories #Dark Matter and Cosmic Phenomena #Galaxy #Photon #Physics #Polarization (electrochemistry) #Quantum mechanics #Redshift #Spacetime #Universe #astro-ph #gr-qc #hep-ph

paper · pdf · doi:10.1103/physrevlett.79.2394

published as Phys.Rev.Lett. 79 (1997) 2394-2397 · 17 pages, including 7 figures. (Arithmetic error corrected, fixing value of chi^2)

arxiv created 1997/04/29 · openalex publication_date 1997/09/29 · arxiv updated 2009/11/30 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/05

Abstract

Measurements of the polarization angle and orientation of cosmological radio sources may be used to search for unusual effects in the propagation of light through the Universe. Recently, Nodland and Ralston [Phys. Rev. Lett. 78, 3043 (1997)] have claimed to find evidence for a redshift- and direction-dependent rotation effect in existing data. We reexamine these data and argue that there is no statistically significant signal present. We are able to place stringent limits on hypothetical chiral interactions of photons propagating through spacetime.

Citations

• New test of the Einstein equivalence principle and the isotropy of space
• Influence of strings with axionic content on the polarization of extragalactic radio sources

Cited by

• LIMITS ON COSMOLOGICAL BIREFRINGENCE FROM THE ULTRAVIOLET POLARIZATION OF DISTANT RADIO GALAXIES
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• Testing ofCP,CPT,and causality violation with light propagation in vacuum in the presence of uniform electric and magnetic fields
• A preferred-direction statistic for sky maps
• Rotation of linear polarization plane and circular polarization from cosmological pseudoscalar fields
• Chern-Simons modification of general relativity
• COVARIANT SYMMETRY CLASSIFICATIONS FOR OBSERVABLES OF COSMOLOGICAL BIREFRINGENCE
• Rotation of the polarization vector from distant radio galaxies in the perturbed FRW metric
• Zero-point energy [wikipedia]