Physics - Astrophysics of Galaxies Physics - Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics Physics - Earth and Planetary Astrophysics Physics - High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena Physics - Instrumentation and Methods for Astrophysics Physics - Solar and Stellar Astrophysics
Astrophys.J.495:29,1998 We estimate the degree to which the baryon density, $\Omega_{b}$, can be
determined from the galaxy power spectrum measured from large scale galaxy
redshift surveys, and in particular, the Sloan Digital Sky Survey. A high
baryon density will cause wiggles to appear in the power spectrum, which should
be observable at the current epoch. We assume linear theory on scales $\geq
20h^{-1}Mpc$ and do not include the effects of redshift distortions, evolution,
or biasing. With an optimum estimate of $P(k)$ to $k\sim 2\pi/(20 h^{-1} Mpc)$,
the $1 \sigma$ uncertainties in $\Omega_{b}$ are roughly 0.07 and 0.016 in flat
and open ($\Omega_{0}=0.3$) cosmological models, respectively. This result
suggests that it should be possible to test for consistency with big bang
nucleosynthesis estimates of $\Omega_{b}$ if we live in an open universe.