English

Cosmic inventory of energy densities: issues and concerns

General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology 2007-05-23 v1 Astrophysics High Energy Physics - Theory

Abstract

The dynamics of our universe is characterised by the density parameters for cosmological constant (ΩV\Omega_V), nonbaryonic darkmatter(Ωwimp\Omega_{\rm wimp}), radiation (ΩR\Omega_R) and baryons (ΩB\Omega_B). To these parameters -- which describe the smooth background universe -- one needs to add at least another dimensionless number (105\sim 10^{-5}) characterising the strength of primordial fluctuations in the gravitational potential, in order to ensure formation of structures by gravitational instability. I discuss several issues related to the description of the universe in terms of these numbers and argue that we do not yet have a fundamental understanding of these issues.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.gr-qc/0112068,
  title  = {Cosmic inventory of energy densities: issues and concerns},
  author = {T. Padmanabhan},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:gr-qc/0112068},
  year   = {2007}
}

Comments

Based on the invited talk at the XIII Rencontres de Blois - Frontiers of the Universe, June 17-23,2001