The scalar, vector and tensor contributions of a stochastic background of magnetic fields to cosmic microwave background anisotropies

We study the contribution of a stochastic background (SB) of primordial magnetic fields (PMFs) on the anisotropies in temperature and polarization of the cosmic microwave background (CMB) radiation. A SB of PMF modelled as a fully inhomogeneous component induces non-Gaussian scalar, vector and tensor metric linear perturbations. We give the exact expressions for the Fourier spectra of the relevant energy–momentum components of such a SB, given a power-law dependence parametrized by a spectral index nB for the magnetic field power spectrum cut at a damping scale kD. For all the values of nB considered here, the contribution to the CMB temperature pattern by such a SB is dominated by the scalar contribution and then by the vector one at higher multipoles. We also give an analytic estimate of the scalar contribution to the CMB temperature pattern.