Tackling tangledness of cosmic strings by knot polynomial topological invariants

Abstract

Cosmic strings in the early universe have received revived interest in recent years. In this paper we derive these structures as topological defects from singular distributions of the quintessence field of dark energy. Our emphasis is placed on the topological charge of tangled cosmic strings, which originates from the Hopf mapping and is a Chern-Simons action possessing strong inherent tie to knot topology. It is shown that the Kauffman bracket knot polynomial can be constructed in terms of this charge for un-oriented knotted strings, serving as a topological invariant much stronger than the traditional Gauss linking numbers in characterizing string topology. Especially, we introduce a mathematical approach of breaking-reconnection which provides a promising candidate for studying physical reconnection processes within the complexity-reducing cascades of tangled cosmic strings.