Related papers: Cosmic Connections
The nature of dark matter remains one of the most important open questions in physics. Although dark matter effects have only been observed gravitationally, the order-one ratio between conventional matter and dark matter hints to a…
The physics of the mysterious and stealthy neutrino is at the heart of many phenomena in the cosmos. These particles interact with matter and with each other through the aptly named weak interaction. At typical astrophysical energies the…
Cosmology is entering a very exciting time in its history, when a wealth of cutting-edge experiments are all starting to collect data, or about to. These experiments aim at addressing some of the most intriguing questions in fundamental…
Cosmological consequences of a coupling between massive neutrinos and dark energy are investigated. In such models, the neutrino mass is a function of a scalar field, which plays the role of dark energy. The background evolution, as well as…
Over the past three years we have determined the basic features of our Universe. It is spatially flat; accelerating; comprised of 1/3 a new form of matter, 2/3 a new form of energy, with some ordinary matter and a dash of massive neutrinos;…
While purely philosophical in the early times, and still very speculative at the beginning of the twentieth century, Cosmology has gradually entered into the realm of experimental science over the past eighty years. It has raised some…
In these lectures I examine some of the principal issues in cosmology from a particle physics point of view. I begin with nucleosynthesis and show how the primordial abundance of the light elements can help fix the number of (light)…
Big-Bang cosmology and ideas for possible physics beyond the Standard Model of particle physics are introduced. The density budget of the Universe is audited, and the issues involved in calculating the baryon density from microphysics are…
Some conceptual problems in physics are discussed. Do we need a change in the concept of matter structure? Why the ``$i=\sqrt{-1}$'' is introduced to quantum mechanics (QM) essentially? What is the relation between QM and special relativity…
Some recent developments concerning the role of strange quark matter for astrophysical systems and the QCD phase transition in the early universe are addressed. Causality constraints of the soft nuclear equation of state as extracted from…
Astrophysics is gaining increased attention from the particle and nuclear physics communities, as budget cuts, delays, and cancellations limit opportunities for breakthrough research at accelerator laboratories. Observations of cosmic rays…
We discuss some current problems in the relationship between elementary particle physics and gravitation, i.e., in the subject investigated by Prof.~K.~P.~Staniukovich half a century ago. Specifically, the inflationary stage of the Universe…
Cosmic high energy neutrinos are inextricably linked to the origin of cosmic rays which is one of the major unresolved questions in astrophysics. In particular, the highest energy cosmic rays observed possess macroscopic energies and their…
The discovery ten years ago that the expansion of the Universe is accelerating put in place the last major building block of the present cosmological model, in which the Universe is composed of 4% baryons, 20% dark matter, and 76% dark…
Answering well-known fundamental questions is usually regarded as the major goal of science. Discovery of other unknown and fundamental questions is, however, even more important. Recognition that "we didn't know anything" is the basic…
In these lectures I highlight some key features of massive neutrinos in the context of cosmology. I first review the thermal history and the free-streaming kinematics of the uniform cosmic background neutrinos. I then describe how…
The nature of dark matter is one of the open problems of the Standard Model of particle physics. Despite the great experimental efforts, we have not yet found a positive signal of its interactions with ordinary matter. One possible…
These lecture notes aim to provide an introduction to dark matter from the perspective of astrophysics/cosmology. We start with a rapid overview of cosmology, including the evolution of the Universe, its thermal history and structure…
We revise the dynamics of interacting vector-like dark energy, a theoretical framework proposed to explain the accelerated expansion of the universe. By investigating the interaction between vector-like dark energy and dark matter, we…
This lecture course covers cosmology from the particle physicist perspective. Therefore, the emphasis will be on the evidence for the new physics in cosmological and astrophysical data together with minimal theoretical frameworks needed to…