CMB ANISOTROPIES CAUSED BY GRAVITATIONAL-WAVES - A PARAMETER STUDY

Anisotropies in the cosmic microwave background radiation due to gravi ty waves are investigated. An initial spectrum of gravity waves may ha ve been induced during an epoch of inflation. We study the propagation of such a spectrum in different Friedmann backgrounds with hot and co ld dark matter, radiation and, possibly, a cosmological constant. We c alculate its imprint as anisotropies on the cosmic microwave backgroun d. We also take into account that massless particles can source gravit y waves by their anisotropic stresses. We consider general mixed dark matter models with and without cosmological constant. For a given, sca le invariant input spectrum of gravity waves, we determine the depende nce of the resulting spectrum of CMB anisotropies on the different par ameters of the model.