Related papers: Precision of inflationary predictions and recent C…
We study several anisotropic inflationary models and their implications for the observed violation of statistical isotropy in the CMBR data. In two of these models the anisotropy decays very quickly during the inflationary phase of…
The presence of a light vector field coupled to a scalar field during inflation makes a distinct prediction: the observed correlation functions of the cosmic microwave background (CMB) become statistically anisotropic. We study the…
The latest Planck results are in excellent agreement with the theoretical expectations predicted from standard normal inflation based on slow-roll approximation which assumes equation-of-state $\omega \geq-1$. In this work, we study the…
I present a briefly summary of the current status of inflationary models versus topological defects scenarios, as the mechanisms which could have induced the initial density perturbations, which left an imprint on the cosmic microwave…
A new method for predicting inflationary cosmological perturbations, based on the Wentzel-Kramers-Brillouin (WKB) approximation, is presented. A general expression for the WKB scalar and tensor power spectra is derived. The main advantage…
The ability to test and constrain theories of cosmic inflation will advance substantially over the next decade. Key data sources include cosmic microwave background (CMB) measurements and observations of the distribution of matter at…
As the data on CMB anisotropies improve and potential cosmological applications are realized, it will be increasingly important for theoretical calculations to be as accurate as possible. All modern calculations for inflationary-inspired…
Gaussianity of the cosmological perturbations in the universe is one of the key predictions of standard inflation, but it is violated by other models of structure formation such as topological defects. We present the first test of the…
Forthcoming cosmic microwave background experiments (CMB) will provide precise new tests of structure-formation theories. The geometry of the Universe may be determined robustly, and the classical cosmological parameters, such as the…
Inflation produces nearly Harrison-Zel'dovich scalar and tensor perturbation spectra which lead to anisotropy in the cosmic microwave background (CMB). The amplitudes and shapes of these spectra can be parametrized by $Q_S^2$, $r\equiv…
This review article aims at presenting the theory of inflation. We first describe the background spacetime behavior during the slow-roll phase and analyze how inflation ends and the Universe reheats. Then, we present the theory of…
We investigate the effects of non-zero spatial curvature on cosmic inflation in the light of cosmic microwave background (CMB) anisotropy measurements from the Planck 2018 legacy release and from the 2015 observing season of BICEP2 and the…
One of the major predictions of inflation is the existence of a stochastic background of cosmological gravitational waves (GW). These gravitational waves can induce significant temperature anisotropies in the Cosmic Microwave Background…
I present a pedagogical review of inflation and the cosmic microwave background. I describe how a short period of accelerated expansion can replace the special initial conditions of the standard big bang model. I also describe the…
We confront the predicted effects of hybrid inflationary models on the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) with three years of Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP) observations. Using model selection, we compare the ability of a simple…
We use the measurement of the cosmic microwave background taken during the MAXIMA-1 flight to estimate the bispectrum of cosmological perturbations. We propose an estimator for the bispectrum that is appropriate in the flat sky…
Prompted by the recent MAXIMA-1 and BOOMERANG-98 measurements of the cosmic microwave background (CMB) anisotropy power spectrum, and motivated by the results from the observation of high-redshift Type Ia supernovae, we investigate CMB…
We investigate the cosmic variance of the skewness of the cosmic microwave background (CMB) anisotropies in an inflationary model which leads to the baryon isocurvature scenario for the cosmic structure formation. In this model, the baryon…
Current measurements of the temperature and polarization anisotropy power spectra of the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) seem to indicate that the naive expectation for the slow-roll hierarchy within the most simple inflationary paradigm…
We present a simple, yet accurate approximation for calculating the cosmic microwave background anisotropy power spectrum in adiabatic models. It consists of solving for the evolution of a two-fluid model until the epoch of recombination…