Related papers: Unavoidable CMB spectral features and blackbody ph…
We review the theoretical implications of the past decade of CMB anisotropy measurements, which culminated in the recent detection of the first feature in the power spectrum, and discuss the tests available to the next decade of…
This is a very exciting time for the CMB field. It is widely recognized that precision measurements of the CMB can provide a definitive test of cosmological models and determine their parameters accurately. At present observations give us…
We give an account, at non-expert and quantitative level, of physics behind the CMB temperature anisotropy and polarization and their peculiar features. We discuss, in particular, how cosmological parameters are determined from the CMB…
In this work we consider CMB spectral distortions as a probe of dark matter microphysics in the early universe. We demonstrate that future experiments such as PRISM have the potential to distinguish between scenarios which offer solutions…
Cosmic microwave background (CMB) spectral distortion from Rayleigh scattering is calculated for the first time in rigorous second-order cosmological perturbation theory. The new spectral distortion is sensitive to acoustic dissipation at…
We find that current Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) anisotropy data strongly constrain the mean spatial curvature of the Universe to be near zero, or, equivalently, the total energy density to be near critical-as predicted by inflation.…
I describe briefly the Cosmic Microwave Background (hereafter CMB) physics which explains why high accuracy observations of its spatial structure are a unique observational tool both for the determination of the global cosmological…
The Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) consists of photons that were last created about 2 months after the Big Bang, and last scattered about 380,000 years after the Big Bang. The spectrum of the CMB is very close to a blackbody at 2.725 K…
We explore a model of the early universe in which the inflationary epoch is preceded by a cosmic bounce, and argue that this scenario provides a common origin to several of the anomalous features that have been observed at large angular…
Vacuum bubbles may nucleate and expand during the cosmic inflation. When inflation ends, the bubbles run into the ambient plasma, producing strong shocks followed by underdensity waves, which propagate outwards. The bubbles themselves…
The Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) provides a precious window on fundamental physics at very high energy scales, possibly including quantum gravity, GUTs and supersymmetry. The CMB has already enabled defect-based rivals to inflation to…
The coupling of photons and baryons by Thomson scattering in the early universe imprints features in both the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) and matter power spectra. The former have been used to constrain a host of cosmological…
We compute cosmic microwave background (CMB) anisotropy constraints on exotic forms of energy injection in electromagnetic (e.m.) channels over a large range of timescales. These constraints are very powerful around or just after…
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.…
This thesis treats the topic of CMB Spectral Distortions (SDs), which represent any deviation from a pure black body shape of the CMB energy spectrum. As such, they can be used to probe the inflationary, expansion and thermal evolution of…
The ten's of micro-Kelvin variations in the temperature of the cosmic microwave background (CMB) radiation across the sky encode a wealth of information about the Universe. The full-sky, high-resolution maps of the CMB that will be made in…
We calculate the spectral distortions from Hawking evaporation of primordial black holes before the epoch of recombination, taking into account emission of all standard model particles, including quark and gluons, and evolving the resulting…
Current observational data favor cosmological models which differ from the standard model due to the presence of some form of dark energy and, perhaps, by additional contributions to the more familiar dark matter. Primordial nucleosynthesis…
The cosmic microwave background (CMB), the relic radiation from the early Universe, offers a unique window into both primordial conditions and the intervening large-scale structure (LSS) it traverses. Interactions between CMB photons and…
We consider the distortions of the cosmic microwave background (CMB) dipole anisotropy related to the primordial recombination radiation (PRR) and primordial $y$- and $\mu$-distortions. The signals arise due to our motion relative to the…