Related papers: Null geodesics and observational cosmology
How does inhomogeneity affect our interpretation of cosmological observations? It has long been wondered to what extent the observable properties of an inhomogeneous universe differ from those of a corresponding…
Cosmology is built on a relativistic understanding of gravity, where the geometry of the Universe is dynamically determined by matter and energy. In the cosmological concordance model, gravity is described by General Relativity, and it is…
The problems of coarse-graining and averaging of inhomogeneous cosmologies, and their backreaction on average cosmic evolution, are reviewed from a physical viewpoint. A particular focus is placed on comparing different notions of average…
Structure occurs over a vast range of scales in the universe. Our large-scale cosmological models are coarse-grained representations of what exists, which have much less structure than there really is. An important problem for cosmology is…
Modern cosmology relies on the assumption of large-scale isotropy and homogeneity of the Universe. However, locally the Universe is inhomogeneous and anisotropic. So, how can local measurements (at the 100 Mpc scale) be used to determine…
Averaging in general relativity is a complicated operation, due to the general covariance of the theory and the non-linearity of Einstein's equations. The latter of these ensures that smoothing spacetime over cosmological scales does not…
It is commonly stated that we have entered the era of precision cosmology in which a number of important observations have reached a degree of precision, and a level of agreement with theory, that is comparable with many Earth-based physics…
We discuss the effect of curvature and matter inhomogeneities on the averaged scalar curvature of the present-day Universe. Motivated by studies of averaged inhomogeneous cosmologies, we contemplate on the question whether it is sensible to…
Astrophysical observations provide a picture of the universe as a 4-dim homogeneous and isotropic flat space-time dominated by an unknown form of dark energy. To achieve such a cosmology one has to consider in the early universe an…
We review spacetime dynamics in the presence of large-scale electromagnetic fields and then consider the effects of the magnetic component on perturbations to a spatially homogeneous and isotropic universe. Using covariant techniques, we…
A refined version of a recently introduced method for analysing the dynamics of an inhomogeneous irrotational dust universe is presented. A fully non-perturbative numerical computation of the time dependence of volume in this framework…
The role of global topology in the dynamics of the Universe is poorly understood. Along with observational programmes for determining the topology of the Universe, some small theoretical steps have recently been made. Heuristic…
Astronomical observations reveal hierarchical structures in the Universe, from galaxies, groups of galaxies, clusters and superclusters, to filaments and voids. On the largest scales it seems that some kind of statistical homogeneity can be…
The paper 0705.0332v1 seeks to study the effect of non-trivial spatial curvature in homogeneous and isotropic models. We note that the space considered is not homogeneous, and that the equations of motion used are inconsistent with the…
Due to the non-commutation of spatial averaging and temporal evolution, inhomogeneities and anisotropies (cosmic structures) influence the evolution of the averaged Universe via the cosmological backreaction mechanism. We study the…
For general number of spatial dimensions we investigate the cosmological dynamics driven by a cosmological constant and by a source with barotropic equation of state. It is assumed that for both those sources the energy density can be…
Cosmology is undergoing an explosive period of activity, fueled both by new, accurate astrophysical data and by innovative theoretical developments. Cosmological parameters such as the total density of the Universe and the rate of…
The Hubble diagram is one of the cornerstones of observational cosmology. It is usually analysed assuming that, on average, the underlying relation between magnitude and redshift matches the prediction of a…
One of the biggest mysteries in cosmology is Dark Energy, which is required to explain the accelerated expansion of the universe within the standard model. But maybe one can explain the observations without introducing new physics, by…
The standard model of cosmology is based on the existence of homogeneous surfaces as the background arena for structure formation. Homogeneity underpins both general relativistic and modified gravity models and is central to the way in…