Related papers: Constraints on cosmological parameters from Planck…
We consider a generic model of quadratic gravity coupled to a single scalar and investigate the effects of gravitational degrees of freedom on inflationary parameters. We find that quantum corrections arising from the massive spin-2 ghost…
We investigate the implications for inflation of the detection of B-modes polarization in the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) by BICEP2. We show that the hypothesis of primordial origin of the measurement is only favored by the first four…
The observational status of inflation after the Planck 2013 and 2015 results and the BICEP2/Keck Array and Planck joint analysis is discussed. These pedagogical lecture notes are intended to serve as a technical guide filling the gap…
We perform a Bayesian analysis to study possible features in the primordial inflationary power spectrum of scalar perturbations. In particular, we analyse the possibility of detecting the imprint of these primordial features in the…
The CMB map provided by the Planck project constrains the value of the ratio of tensor-to-scalar perturbations, namely $r$, to be smaller than $0.11$ (95% CL). This bound rules out the simplest models of inflation. However, recent data from…
Statistical isotropy is often assumed in cosmology and should be tested rigorously against observational data. We construct simple quadratic estimators to reconstruct asymmetry in the primordial power spectrum from CMB temperature and…
The recent BICEP2 detection of, what is claimed to be primordial $B$-modes, opens up the possibility of constraining not only the energy scale of inflation but also the detailed acceleration history that occurred during inflation. In turn…
We show the possibility that the observational results of the primordial gravitational waves from Planck and BICEP2 for the tensor-to-scalar ratio $r$ can be reconciled when an early dark energy was included. This early dark energy behaves…
We study the global agreement between the most recent observations of the Cosmic Microwave Background temperature and polarization anisotropies angular power spectra released by the Atacama Cosmology Telescope and the Planck satellite in…
Combining Planck CMB temperature [1] and BICEP2 B-mode polarization data [2,3] we show qualitatively that, assuming inflationary consistency relation, the power-law form of the scalar primordial spectrum is ruled out at more than $3\sigma$…
The announcement by BICEP2 of the detection of B-mode polarization consistent with primordial gravitational waves with a tensor-to-scalar ratio, $r=0.2^{+0.07}_{-0.05}$, challenged predictions from most inflationary models of a lower value…
In light of the recent BICEP2 B-mode polarization detection, which implies a large inflationary tensor-to-scalar ratio r_{0.05}=0.2^{+0.07}_{-0.05}, we re-examine the evidence for an extra sterile massive neutrino, originally invoked to…
We present new constraints on coupled dark energy from the recent measurements of the Cosmic Microwave Background Anisotropies from the Planck satellite mission. We found that a coupled dark energy model is fully compatible with the Planck…
The secondary cosmic microwave background (CMB) $B$-modes stem from the post-decoupling distortion of the polarization $E$-modes due to the gravitational lensing effect of large-scale structures. These lensing-induced $B$-modes constitute…
The two fundamental assumptions in cosmology are that the Universe is statistically homogeneous and isotropic when averaged on large scales. Given the big implication of these assumptions, there has been a lot of statistical tests carried…
The measurement of B-mode polarization of the cosmic microwave background at large angular scales by the BICEP experiment suggests a stochastic gravitational wave background from early-universe inflation with a surprisingly large amplitude.…
Using an approximate likelihood method adapted to band--power estimates, we analyze the ensemble of first generation cosmic microwave background anisotropy experiments to deduce constraints over a six--dimensional parameter space describing…
Large field inflation models are favored by the recent BICEP2 that has detected gravitational wave modes generated during inflation. We study general large field inflation models for which the potential contains (constant) quadratic and…
Measurement of Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) temperature by Planck has resulted in extremely tight constraints on the $\Lambda$CDM model. However the data indicates a evidence of dipole modulated temperature fluctuations at large…
Power spectra always play an important role in the theory of inflation. In particular, the ability to reproduce the galaxy matter power spectrum and the CMB temperature angular power spectrum coefficients to high accuracy is often…