Global 21 cm signal: A promising probe of primordial features

Abstract

Inflationary models that involve bursts of particle production generate bump-like features in the primordial power spectrum of density perturbations. These features influence the evolution of density fluctuations, leaving their unique signatures in cosmological observations. A detailed investigation of such signatures would help constrain physical processes during inflation. With this motivation, the goal of this paper is two-fold. First, we conduct a detailed analysis of the effects of bump-like primordial features on the sky-averaged 21 cm signal. Using semi-numerical simulations, we demonstrate that the primordial features can significantly alter the ionization history and the global 21 cm profile, making them a promising probe of inflationary models. We found a special scale (namely, the turnover wavenumber, kturn) at which the effect of primordial bump-like features on the global 21 cm profile vanishes. Also, we found that the behaviour of the primordial features on the global profile and ionization history are quite opposite for k > kturn and k < kturn. We trace the root cause of these behaviours to the effects of primordial features on the halo mass function at high redshifts. Furthermore, we discuss the degeneracy between the astrophysical parameters and the primordial features in detail. Secondly, for a fixed set of astrophysical parameters, we derive upper limits on the amplitude of bump-like features in the range 10-1 < k [ Mpc^-1] < 102 using current limits on optical depth to reionization from CMB data by Planck.