Related papers: Observational constraints on cosmic strings: Bayes…
In a recent paper, which has been published in Nature, the LIGO Scientific Collaboration (LSC) obtained an upper limit on the stochastic gravitational-wave background of cosmological origin by using the data from a two-year science run of…
While usually cosmological initial conditions are assumed to be Gaussian, inflationary theories can predict a certain amount of primordial non-Gaussianity which can have an impact on the statistical properties of the lensing observables. In…
We investigate the ability of current CMB data to reliably constrain the form of the primordial power spectrum generated during inflation. We attempt to identify more exotic power spectra that yield equally good fits to the data as simple…
We examine which information on the early cosmological history can be extracted from the potential measurement by third-generation gravitational-wave observatories of a stochastic gravitational wave background (SGWB) produced by cosmic…
The observational data on the large scale structure (LSS) of the Universe are used to establish the upper limit on the neutrino content marginalized over all other cosmological parameters within the class of adiabatic inflationary models.…
Cosmic string loops contain cusps which decay by emitting bursts of particles. A significant fraction of the released energy is in the form of photons. These photons are injected non-thermally and can hence cause spectral distortions of the…
We study diffusion damping of acoustic waves in the photon-baryon fluid due to cosmic strings, and calculate the induced $\mu$- and $y$-type spectral distortions of the cosmic microwave background. For cosmic strings with tension within…
Cosmic strings are predicted by many field-theory models, and may have been formed at a symmetry-breaking transition early in the history of the universe, such as that associated with grand unification. They could have important…
Different inflationary models predict oscillatory features in the primordial power spectrum. These can leave an imprint on both the cosmic microwave background (CMB) and the large-scale structure (LSS) of our Universe, that can be searched…
Quintessential inflation provides a unified description of the early and late accelerated phases of the Universe, linking the inflationary epoch to the present-day dark energy-dominated era through a single scalar degree of freedom. In this…
We examine the constraints cosmological observations can place on any trans-Planckian corrections to the primordial spectrum of perturbations underlying the anisotropies in the Cosmic Microwave Background. We focus on models of…
We study the tilt of the primordial gravitational waves spectrum. A hint of blue tilt is shown from analyzing the BICEP2 and POLARBEAR data. Motivated by this, we explore the possibilities of blue tensor spectra from the very early universe…
Constraints on the potential properties of superconducting cosmic strings provide an indirect probe of physics beyond the standard model at energies inaccessible to terrestrial particle colliders. In this study, we perform the first joint…
We constrain the spectrum of primordial curvature perturbations by using recent Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) and Large Scale Structure (LSS) data. Specifically, we consider CMB data from the COBE, Boomerang and Maxima experiments, the…
We introduce a new technique to detect the discrete temperature steps that cosmic strings might have left in the cosmic microwave background (CMB) anisotropy map. The technique provides a validity test on the pattern search of cosmic…
Even simple inflationary scenarios have many free parameters. Beyond the variables appearing in the inflationary action, these include dynamical initial conditions, the number of fields, and couplings to other sectors. These quantities are…
The presence of non--Gaussian features in the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) radiation maps represents one of the most long--awaited clues in the search for the actual structure of the primordial radiation, still needing confirmation.…
We search for a stochastic gravitational wave background (SGWB) generated by a network of cosmic strings using six millisecond pulsars from Data Release 2 (DR2) of the European Pulsar Timing Array (EPTA). We perform a Bayesian analysis…
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…
Models of cosmic inflation generically predict a weak but potentially detectable amount of primordial non-Gaussianity (PNG), which can be used to obtain insights into the degrees of freedom during inflation and their interactions. The…