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Data on the cosmic microwave background (CMB) are discriminating between different models of inflation, disfavoring simple monomial potentials whilst being consistent with models whose predictions resemble those of the Starobinsky $R + R^2$…
Methods and concepts for the study of phase transitions mediated by a time-dependent order-parameter field in curved spacetimes are discussed. A practical example is the derivation of an effective (quasi-)potential for the description of…
Recent analyses in the literature suggest that the concordance $\Lambda$CDM model with rigid cosmological term, $\Lambda=$const., may not be the best description of the cosmic acceleration. The class of "running vacuum models", in which…
There has been considerable interest in recent years in cosmological models in which we inhabit a very large, underdense void as an alternative to dark energy. A longstanding objection to this proposal is that observations limit our…
I review a cosmological model based on string-inspired gravity with anomalies and torsion, which leads to a cosmology of running-vacuum-model (RVM) type. It is argued that such a model can lead to observable, in principle, deviations from…
We point out that the recently proposed Swampland conjecture on the potential gradient can lead to isocurvature perturbations of dark energy, if the quintessence field acquires large quantum fluctuations during high-scale inflation…
We propose a dynamical dark energy model based on a canonical scalar field with a hybrid potential of the form $V(\phi) = V_{0}e^{-\lambda\phi} + V_{1}\phi^{n}$. We constrain the model's 11-dimensional parameter space using a comprehensive…
In String Gas Cosmology, the simplest shape modulus fields are naturally stabilized by taking into account the presence of string winding and momentum modes. We determine the resulting effective potential for these fields and show that it…
Current constraints on spatial curvature show that it is dynamically negligible: $|\Omega_{\rm K}| \lesssim 5 \times 10^{-3}$ (95% CL). Neglecting it as a cosmological parameter would be premature however, as more stringent constraints on…
This article aims at drawing the attention of astronomers on the ability of future cosmological surveys to put constraints on string theory. The fact that "quantum gravity" might be constrained by large scale astrophysical observations is a…
We show that one can find de Sitter critical points (saddle points) in models of flux compactification of Type IIB String Theory without any uplifting terms and in the presence of several moduli. We demonstrate this by giving explicit…
Horndeski models with a de Sitter critical point for any kind of material content may provide a mechanism to alleviate the cosmological constant problem. Moreover, they could allow us to understand the current accelerated expansion of the…
Among various phenomenological $\Lambda$ models, a time-dependent model $\dot \Lambda\sim H^3$ is selected here to investigate the $\Lambda$-CDM cosmology. Using this model the expressions for the time-dependent equation of state parameter…
Convergence of the Schwinger --- DeWitt expansion for the evolution operator kernel for special class of potentials is studied. It is shown, that this expansion, which is in general case asymptotic, converges for the potentials considered…
We construct gravitational modifications that go beyond Horndeski, namely theories with extended nonminimal derivative couplings, in which the coefficient functions depend not only on the scalar field but also on its kinetic energy. Such…
We investigate the extent to which the Swampland Conjecture can be employed to constrain large-field inflationary models from the perspective of quantum gravity consistency. In particular, we focus on the Swampland Distance Conjecture,…
We investigate cosmic censorship in anti-de Sitter space in holographic models in which the ground state is described by a good singularity. These include supersymmetric truncations of string/M-theory, for which a positive-energy theorem…
The vacuum inflation with a boundary condition specified at a short-distance scale in a generally primeval non-flat Universe, and implications of the correspondingly modified primordial power spectrum via the WMAP data are investigated. We…
The relation between confinement scale $\Lambda_c$ of a gauge theory and the Hubble scale $H$ of the background quasi de Sitter space, required to satisfy the Festina Lente criteria ($\Lambda_c \gtrsim H$) from swampland principles, are…
Quintessence models leading to a constant equation of state are studied in hyperbolic universes. General properties of the quintessence potentials V(phi) are discussed, and for some special cases also the exact analytic expressions for…