English

Scalar Field Cosmologies and the Initial Space-Time Singularity

General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology 2009-10-31 v1

Abstract

The singularity structure of cosmological models whose matter content consists of a scalar field with arbitrary non-negative potential is discussed. The special case of spatially flat FRW space-time is analysed in detail using a dynamical systems approach which may readily be generalised to more complicated space-times. It is shown that for a very large and natural class of models a simple and regular past asymptotic structure exists. More specifically, there exists a family of solutions which is in continuous 1-1 correspondence with the exactly integrable massless scalar field cosmologies, this correspondence being realised by a unique asymptotic approximation. The set of solutions which do not fall into this class has measure zero. The significance of this result to the cosmological initial value problem is briefly discussed.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.gr-qc/9806098,
  title  = {Scalar Field Cosmologies and the Initial Space-Time Singularity},
  author = {S. Foster},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:gr-qc/9806098},
  year   = {2009}
}

Comments

31 pages, 3 figures

R2 v1 2026-07-22T12:55:06.257Z