2014/07/31 by Stephen R. Green, Robert M. Wald · 1 citation
Physics and Astronomy · #gr-qc #astro-ph.CO #hep-th
paper · pdf · doi:10.1088/0264-9381/31/23/234003
published as Class. Quantum Grav. 31 (2014) 234003 · Invited contribution to a Classical and Quantum Gravity focus issue on "Relativistic Effects in Cosmology", edited by Kazuya Koyama; 18 pages, 2 figures. V2: References added and minor wording changes made
arxiv created 2014/10/16 · arxiv updated 2014/11/17
Extremely well! In the ΛCDM model, the spacetime metric, gab, of our universe is approximated by an FLRW metric, gab(0), to about 1 part in 104 or better on both large and small scales, except in the immediate vicinity of very strong field objects, such as black holes. However, derivatives of gab are not close to derivatives of gab(0), so there can be significant differences in the behavior of geodesics and huge differences in curvature. Consequently, observable quantities in the actual universe may differ significantly from the corresponding observables in the FLRW model. Nevertheless, as we shall review here, we have proven general results showing that---within the framework of our approach to treating backreaction---the large matter inhomogeneities that occur on small scales cannot produce significant effects on large scales, so gab(0) satisfies Einstein's equation with the averaged stress-energy tensor of matter as its source. We discuss the flaws in some other approaches that have suggested that large backreaction effects may occur. As we also will review here, with a suitable "dictionary," Newtonian cosmologies provide excellent approximations to cosmological solutions to Einstein's equation (with dust and a cosmological constant) on all scales. Our results thereby provide strong justification for the mathematical consistency and validity of the ΛCDM model within the context of general relativistic cosmology.