Related papers: Ten Major Challenges in Cosmology
The idea of possible time or space variations of the `fundamental' constants of nature, although not new, is only now beginning to be actively considered by large numbers of researchers in the particle physics, cosmology and astrophysics…
The standard big bang cosmological model and the history of the early universe according to the grand unified theories of strong, weak and electromagnetic interactions are summarized. The shortcomings of big bang are discussed together with…
Current theories of particle physics lead to the unavoidable conclusion that there must have been several phase transitions in the early universe. Further, in the context of these theories, it is possible that cosmological phase transitions…
Where does it all come from? Where are we going? Are we alone in the universe? What is good and what is evil? The scientific narrative of cosmic evolution demands that we tackle such big questions with a cosmological perspective. I tackle…
The fourth chapter of the collection of problems in cosmology, devoted to black holes. Consists of basic introduction, sections on Schwarzschild and Kerr black holes, a section on particles' motion and collisions in general black hole…
The network of cosmological tests is tight enough now to show that the relativistic Big Bang cosmology is a good approximation to what happened as the universe expanded and cooled through light element production and evolved to the present.…
The past few years have seen several breakthroughs in particle astrophysics and cosmology. In several cases, new observations can only be explained with the introduction of new fundamental physics. In this talk I summarize some of these…
The old cosmological constant problem is to understand why the vacuum energy is so small; the new problem is to understand why it is comparable to the present mass density. Several approaches to these problems are reviewed. Quintessence…
Various contributions to the cosmological constant are discussed and confronted with its recent measurement. We briefly review different scenarious -- and their difficulties -- for a solution of the cosmological constant problem.
The physical basis of the modern cosmological inflationary models with baryosynthesis and nonbaryonic dark matter and energy implies such predictions of particle theory, that, in turn, apply to cosmology for their test. It makes physics of…
Over the last decades, observations with increasing quality have revolutionized our understanding of the general properties of the Universe. Questions posed for millenia by mankind about the origin, evolution and structure of the cosmos…
This article reviews the prevailing paradigm for how galaxies and larger structures formed in the universe: gravitational instability. Basic observational facts are summarized to motivate the standard cosmological framework underlying most…
For most of its history, cosmology was a qualitatively constrained discourse on the universe, shaped by limited observational access and the absence of global dynamical laws. This situation has changed decisively in recent decades. Modern…
Existing physical theories do not predict every feature of our experience but only certain regularities of that experience. That difference between what could be observed and what can be predicted is one kind of limit on scientific…
The most dramatic developments in theoretical physics in the next millennium are likely to come when we make progress on so far unresolved foundational questions. In this essay I consider two of the deepest problems confronting us, the…
From an observational perspective cosmology is today in excellent shape - advances in instrumentation and data processing have enabled us to study the universe in detail back to when the first galaxies formed, map the fluctuations in the…
I discuss the classical cosmological tests-- angular size-redshift, flux-redshift, and galaxy number counts-- in the light of the cosmology prescribed by the intepretation of CMB anisotropies. The discussion is somewhat of a primer for…
Does inflation provide a compelling explanation for why the universe is so large, so flat, and so old, and a predictive theory of density perturbations? In this brief contribution (based on the role of the author as moderator of the…
This article is the written version of the closing talk presented at the conference `A Century of Cosmology' held at San Servolo, Italy, in August 2007. I focus on the prospects of constraining fundamental physics from cosmological…
This meeting is entitled "A Century of Cosmology." But most of the papers being given here are based on work done very recently and there is really no attempt being made to critically review what has taken place in the last 90 or 100 years.…