Anisotropy in the cosmic acceleration inferred from supernovae.

Abstract

Under the assumption that they are standard(izable) candles, the lightcurves of Type Ia supernovae have been analysed in the framework of the standard Friedmann-Lemaitre-Robertson-Walker cosmology to conclude that the expansion rate of the Universe is accelerating due to dark energy. While the original claims in the late 1990s were made using overlapping samples of less than 100 supernovae in total, catalogues of nearly 2000 supernovae are now available. In light of recent developments such as the cosmic dipole anomaly and the larger-than-expected bulk flow in the local Universe (which does not converge to the Cosmic Rest Frame), we analyse the newer datasets using a Maximum Likelihood Estimator and find that the acceleration of the expansion rate of the Universe is unequivocally anisotropic. The associated debate in the literature highlights the artifices of using supernovae as standardizable candles, while also providing deeper insights into a consistent relativistic view of peculiar motions as departures from the Hubble expansion of the Universe. The effects of our being 'tilted observers' embedded in a deep bulk flow may have been mistaken for cosmic acceleration.This article is part of the discussion meeting issue 'Challenging the standard cosmological model'.