Gravitational Lensing by Cosmic Strings at Capped Tension: Image Separations, Shear Steps, and Survey Reach

This paper computes a consequence of the torsion-regulated bounce for topological defects, using the density ceiling of 9.718e+54 grams per cubic centimetre and the maximum temperature of 3.278e+22 kelvin that follows from it. The deficit angle at the capped tension is 1.091e-18 radians, which is 2.251e-13 arcseconds before projection. Projected through cosmological lens geometry the image separation is 5.627e-14 arcseconds at a distance ratio of 0.25, 1.125e-13 at 0.5, and 2.251e-13 at unity. A survey resolving a tenth of an arcsecond could detect a string pair only if the tension were at least 3.858e-08, corresponding to a symmetry scale of 2.398e+15 GeV; the ceiling falls short of that tension by a factor of 8.886e+11. Even a hypothetical instrument a thousand times sharper would not reach the predicted separation. Lensing by individual strings is therefore not a viable test of this framework at any foreseeable angular resolution, and non-detections in lensing surveys, while valuable as general bounds, carry no information about the ceiling. The calculation is performed from stated assumptions with all arithmetic deposited, and it is a computation, not a measurement.