Primordial Nucleosynthesis
Abstract
The current of status of big bang nucleosynthesis is reviewed and the concordance between theory and observation is examined in detail. It is argued that when using the observational data on he4 and li7, the two isotopes whose abundances are least affected by chemical and stellar evolution, both are completely consistent with BBN theory. In addition, these isotopes determine the value of the baryon-to-photon ratio, to be relatively low, , which happens to agree with some recent measurements of D/H in quasar absorption systems. These results have far reaching consequences for galactic chemical evolution, the amount of baryonic dark matter in the Universe and on the allowed number of degrees of freedom in the early Universe.
Keywords
Cite
@article{arxiv.astro-ph/9609071,
title = {Primordial Nucleosynthesis},
author = {Keith A. Olive},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:astro-ph/9609071},
year = {2008}
}
Comments
19 pages, latex, 8 ps figures, Summary of talks presented at the VIIIth Recontres de Blois, Neutrinos, Dark Matter, and the Universe, Blois, France, June 8-12, 1996 and the XVII International Conference on Neutrino Physics and Astrophysics, $\nu$'96, Helsinki, Findland, June 13-19, 1996