Related papers: WMAP, Planck, cosmic rays and unconventional cosmo…
Statistical isotropy (SI) has been one of the simplifying assumptions in cosmological model building. Experiments like WMAP and PLANCK are attempting to test this assumption by searching for specific signals in the Cosmic Microwave…
I present a series of diagrams which illustrate why the cosmic microwave background (CMB) data favor certain values for the cosmological parameters. Various methods to extract these parameters from CMB and non-CMB observations are forming…
Physical models for the hemispherical power asymmetry in the cosmic microwave background (CMB) reported by the Planck Collaboration must satisfy CMB constraints to the homogeneity of the Universe and quasar constraints to power asymmetries.…
In both WMAP and Planck observations on the temperature anisotropy of cosmic microwave background (CMB) radiation a number of large-scale anomalies were discovered in the past years, including the CMB parity asymmetry in the low multipoles.…
Our current description of the large-scale Universe is now known with a precision undreamt of a generation ago. Within the simple standard cosmological model only six basic parameters are required. The usual parameter set includes…
In the last decade, the study of the overall shape of the universe, called Cosmic Topology, has become testable by astronomical observations, especially the data from the Cosmic Microwave Background (hereafter CMB) obtained by WMAP and…
Since the temperature fluctuations in cosmic microwave background (CMB) on large-angular scales probe length scales that were super-horizon sized at photon decoupling and hence insensitive to microphysical processes, the low-multipole CMB…
In the last few decades, advances in observational cosmology have given us a standard model of cosmology. We know the content of the universe to within a few percent. With more ambitious experiments on the way, we hope to move beyond the…
Super-high energy corpuscular and gamma rays as well as cosmic high--power density sources are hard to explain in a galaxy model framework. Attempts to include some of those phenomena in the Standard Cosmological Model also encounter…
The Planck and WMAP9 satellites, as well as the ATACAMA and South Pole telescopes, have recently presented results on the angular power spectrum of the comic microwave background. Data tentatively point to the existence of an extra…
Recent announcements that the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) - the faint remnant of the Big Bang - is polarized have caused a stir among cosmologists. Such polarization has long been predicted but could not be detected, until the recent…
The cosmic microwave background (CMB) radiation provides a remarkable window onto the early universe, revealing its composition and structure. In these lectures we review and discuss the physics underlying the main features of the CMB.
Recent cosmological observations of unprecented accuracy, by WMAP in particular, have established a `Standard Model' of cosmology, just as LEP established the Standard Model of particle physics. Both Standard Models raise open questions…
The cosmic microwave background (CMB) is a relic radiation of the Big Bang and as such it contains a wealth of cosmological information. Statistical analyses of the CMB, in conjunction with other cosmological observables, represent some of…
What do the data, as distinguished from cosmological models, tell us about cosmological parameters that determined the model of the universe? In this paper, we address this question in the context of the WMAP angular power spectra for the…
This paper presents strong observational evidence of numerous previously unobserved anomalous circular spots, of significantly raised temperature, in the CMB sky. The spots have angular radii between 0.03 and 0.04 radians (i.e. angular…
Some inconsistencies to the assumption of a cosmological origin of the cosmic microwave background CMB, such as the absence of gravitational lensing in the WMAP data, open the doors to some speculations such as a local origin to the CMB. We…
Persistent evidence for a cosmic hemispherical asymmetry in the temperature field of cosmic microwave background (CMB) as observed by both WMAP as well as PLANCK increases the possibility of its cosmological origin. Presence of this signal…
The properties of the cosmic microwave background radiation provide unique constraints on cosmological models, i.e. on the content, history, and evolution of the Universe. I discuss the latest measurements of the spectral and spatial…
The Standard Cosmological Model has experienced tremendous success at reproducing observational data by assuming a universe dominated by a cosmological constant and dark matter in a flat geometry. However, several studies, based on local…