Paper 4, Section I, D
Part II, 2010
The linearised equation for the growth of density perturbations, , in an isotropic and homogenous universe is
where is the density of matter, the sound speed, , and is the comoving wavevector and is the scale factor of the universe.
What is the Jean's length? Discuss its significance for the growth of perturbations.
Consider a universe filled with pressure-free matter with . Compute the resulting equation for the growth of density perturbations. Show that your equation has growing and decaying modes and comment briefly on the significance of this fact.