Related papers: A Preposterous Universe
Baryon-density perturbations of large amplitude may exist if they are compensated by dark-matter perturbations so that the total density remains unchanged. Big-bang nucleosynthesis and galaxy clusters allow the amplitudes of these…
Much recent work on the cosmic microwave background (CMB) has focussed on the angular power spectrum of temperature anisotropies and particularly on the recovery of cosmological parameters from acoustic peaks in the power spectrum. However,…
The upcoming generation of cosmic microwave background (CMB) experiments face a major challenge in detecting the weak cosmic B-mode signature predicted as a product of primordial gravitational waves. To achieve the required sensitivity…
Current theories of the origin of the Universe, including string theory, predict the existence of a multiverse containing many bubble universes. These bubble universes will generically collide, and collisions with ours produce cosmic wakes…
We summarize the utility of precise cosmic microwave background (CMB) polarization measurements as probes of the physics of inflation. We focus on the prospects for using CMB measurements to differentiate various inflationary mechanisms. In…
Scattering of the cosmic microwave background (CMB) in clusters of galaxies polarizes the radiation. We explore several polarization components which have their origin in the kinematic quadrupole moments induced by the motion of the…
We calculate the large scale polarization of the cosmic microwave background induced by the anisotropy of the spatial geometry of our universe. Assuming an eccentricity at decoupling of about $0.64 10^{-2}$, we find $\Delta T_{pol}/ T_0…
The Microwave Anisotropy Probe and Planck missions will provide low noise maps of the temperature of the cosmic microwave background (CMB). These maps will allow measurement of the power spectrum of the CMB with measurement noise below…
The cosmic microwave background (CMB) provides us with our most direct observational window to the early universe. Observations of the temperature and polarization anisotropies in the CMB have played a critical role in defining the…
We discuss fluctuations in the cosmic microwave background (CMB) polarization due to scattering from reionized gas at low redshifts. Polarization is produced by re-scattering of the primordial temperature anisotropy quadrupole and of the…
We summarize some applications of big bang nucleosythesis (BBN) and the cosmic microwave background (CMB) to constrain the first moments of the creation of matter in the universe. We review the basic elements of BBN and how it constraints…
TeV string-mass-scale strings have been excluded experimentally at colliders, as their effects have not been observed at the Large Hadron Collider (CERN). On the other hand, higher-scale string theory, with mass scales typically close to…
We study the signal in the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) polarization anisotropy resulting from patchy reionization. It is well known that the primordial polarization of the CMB is very sensitive to the details of reionization.…
Temperature and polarization variations across the microwave sky include the fingerprints of quantum fluctuations in the early universe. They may soon reveal physics at unprecedented energy scales.
The detection of B-modes in the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) polarization by the BICEP2 experiment, if interpreted as evidence for a primordial gravitational wave background, has enormous ramifications for cosmology and physics. It is…
Since the temperature fluctuations in cosmic microwave background (CMB) on large-angular scales probe length scales that were super-horizon sized at photon decoupling and hence insensitive to microphysical processes, the low-multipole CMB…
This review describes the discovery of the cosmic microwave background radiation in 1965 and its impact on cosmology in the 50 years that followed. This discovery has established the Big Bang model of the Universe and the analysis of its…
Measuring the imprint of primordial gravitational waves in the cosmic microwave background (CMB) polarisation field is one of the main goals in modern cosmology. However, the so called $B$-mode polarisation can be generated by different…
We investigate the observational signatures of three models of the early Universe in the $B$-mode polarization of the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) radiation. In addition to the standard single field inflationary model, we also consider…
The origin of large-scale magnetic fields in the Universe is still unknown. Observations suggest the presence of nGauss primordial magnetic fields at the last scattering surface. The presence of such fields will affect the evolution of…