Generation of large scale magnetic fields at recombination epoch

It is argued that large scale cosmic magnetic field could be generated in the primeval plasma slightly before hydrogen recombination. Non-zero vorticity, necessary for that, might be created by the photon diffusion in the second order in the temperature fluctuations. The resulting seed fields at galactic scale would be (8-9) orders of magnitude smaller than the observed ones and with a reasonable galactic dynamo amplifying the seed fields by the factor similar to10(8)-10(9) an existence of coherent magnetic fields in galaxies may be explained. (C) 2004 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.