Phys. Rev. D 62, 103008 (2000) [5 pages]Cosmological magnetic fields from primordial helicityReceived 4 January 2000; published 26 October 2000 Primordial magnetic fields may account for all or part of the fields observed in galaxies. We consider the evolution of the magnetic fields created by pseudoscalar effects in the early universe. Such processes can create force-free fields of maximal helicity; we show that, for such a field, magnetic energy inverse cascades to larger scales than it would have solely by flux freezing and cosmic expansion. For fields generated at the electroweak phase transition, we find that the predicted wavelength today can in principle be as large as ∼10 kpc, and the field strength can be as large as ∼10-10 G. © 2000 The American Physical Society URL:
http://link.aps.org/doi/10.1103/PhysRevD.62.103008
DOI:
10.1103/PhysRevD.62.103008
PACS:
98.35.Eg, 98.80.Cq
|
|
About | Terms and Conditions | Subscriptions | Search | Help
Use of the American Physical Society websites and journals implies that the user has read and agrees to our Terms and Conditions and any applicable Subscription Agreement. Physical Review®, Physical Review Letters®, Reviews of Modern Physics®, and Physical Review Special Topics® are trademarks of the American Physical Society.