Related papers: Does History Repeat Itself? Periodic Time Cosmolog…
Cosmography represents an important branch of cosmology which aims to describe the universe without the need of postulating \emph{a priori} any particular cosmological model. All quantities of interest are expanded as a Taylor series around…
The standard method for observationally confirming the existence of a predicted finite topology of the universe involves searching for the repetition of the same finite or extended source in different directions. However, serious problems…
Suppose the usual description of spacetime as a 4-dimensional manifold with a Lorentzian metric breaks down at Planck energies. Can we still construct sensible theoretical models of the universe? Are they testable? Do they lead to a…
Current evidence suggests that the cosmological constant is not zero, or that we live in an open universe. We examine the implications for the future under these assumptions, and find that they are striking. If the Universe is cosmological…
If we assume that the cosmic energy density will remain constant or strictly increase in the future, then the possible fates for the universe can be divided into four categories based on the time asymptotics of the Hubble parameter H(t):…
Faced by recent evidence for a flat universe dominated by dark energy, cosmologists grapple with deep cosmic enigmas such as the cosmological constant problem, extreme fine-tuning and the cosmic coincidence problem. The extent to which we…
The hot big-bang cosmology provides a reliable accounting of the Universe from about $10^{-2}\sec$ after the bang until the present, as well as a robust framework for speculating back to times as early as $10^{-43}\sec$. Cosmology faces a…
Cosmological inflation, if it occurred, radically alters the picture of the `big bang', which would merely point to reheating at the end of inflation. Moreover, this reheating may be only local, so that inflation continues elsewhere and…
If the parameters defining the physics of our universe departed from their present values, the observed rich structure and complexity would not be supported. This article considers whether similar fine-tuning of parameters applies to…
In the standard FRW formalism, the scale factor is assumed to describe the expansion of the universe. However, by examining empty space with a positive cosmological constant (i.e., a de Sitter space), we find that this assumption is…
A precise measurement of the curvature of the Universe is of primeval importance for cosmology since it could not only confirm the paradigm of primordial inflation but also help in discriminating between different early Universe scenarios.…
We propose a cosmological model that makes a significant step toward solving the coincidence problem of the near similarity at the present of the dark energy and dark matter components. Our cosmology has the following properties: a) among…
The fact that the energy densities of dark energy and matter are similar currently, known as the coincidence problem, is one of the main unsolved problems of cosmology. We present here a model in which a spatial curvature of the universe…
An oscillating universe cycles through a series of expansions and contractions. We propose a model in which ``phantom'' energy with $p < -\rho$ grows rapidly and dominates the late-time expanding phase. The universe's energy density is so…
The initial conditions of our universe appear to us in the form of a classical probability distribution that we probe with cosmological observations. In the current leading paradigm, this probability distribution arises from a quantum…
Did the universe have a beginning or does it exist forever, i.e. is it eternal at least in relation to the past? This fundamental question was a main topic in ancient philosophy of nature and the Middle Ages. Philosophically it was more or…
We consider a class of toy models where a spatially flat universe is filled with a perfect fluid. The dynamics is found exactly for all these models. In one family, the perfect fluid is of the phantom type and we find that the universe is…
There is a paradox in the standard model of cosmology. How can matter in the early universe have been in thermal equilibrium, indicating maximum entropy, but the initial state also have been low entropy (the "past hypothesis"), so as to…
We investigate the string configuration that, in the framework of the theoretical scenario introduced in [1], corresponds to the most entropic configuration in the phase space of all the configurations of the universe. This describes a…
The $\Lambda$CDM model, or concordance cosmology, as it is often called, is a paradigm at its maturity. It is clearly able to describe the universe at large scale, even if some issues remain open, such as the cosmological constant problem ,…