Related papers: Tracking Quintessence Would Require Two Cosmic Coi…
We present a realistic scenario of tracking of scalar fields with varying equation of state. The astrophysical constraints on the evolution of scalar fields in the physical universe are discussed. The nucleosynthesis and the galaxy…
There are indications from the study of quasar absorption spectra that the fine structure constant $\alpha$ may have been measurably smaller for redshifts $z>2.$ Analyses of other data ($^{149}$Sm fission rate for the Oklo natural reactor,…
The ratio of the curvaton energy density to that of the dominant component of the background sources may be constant during a significant period in the evolution of the Universe. The possibility of having tracking curvatons, whose decay…
We propose a time-varying cosmological constant with a fixed equation of state, which evolves mainly through its interaction with the background during most of the long history of the universe. However, such interaction does not exist in…
Observation indicates that the expansion of the Universe is accelerating and favours a dynamical cosmological constant, \Lambda(t). We consider the possibility that this is due to a scalar field which has undergone a very recent phase…
We describe a model of hybrid quintessence in which in addition to the tracker field there is a trigger field which is responsible for ending quintessence. As a result, hybrid quintessence does not suffer from the problems associated with…
A generic feature of cosmic quintessence models is the possibility of significant energy density in the scalar field during the radiation dominated epoch. This possibility is even greater if the quintessence field begins in a…
The latest DESI DR2 results, when combined with other independent cosmological data on the Cosmic Microwave Background and supernovas, suggest a preference for dynamical dark energy. We propose a novel cosmological scenario, which features…
We discuss some of the issues which we encounter when we try to invoke the scalar-tensor theories of gravitation as a theoretical basis of quintessence. One of the advantages of appealing to these theories is that they allow us to implement…
Tracking a randomly varying optical phase is a key task in metrology, with applications in optical communication. The best precision for optical phase tracking has till now been limited by the quantum vacuum fluctuations of coherent light.…
We combine complementary datasets from Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) anisotropy measurements, high redshift supernovae (SN-Ia) observations and data from local cluster abundances and galaxy clustering (LSS) to constrain the dark energy…
We discuss the phenomenological model in which the potential energy of the quintessence field depends linearly on the energy density of the spatial curvature. We find that the pressure of the scalar field takes a different form when the…
We propose a new dark energy model for solving the cosmological fine-tuning and coincidence problems. A default assumption is that the fine-tuning problem disappears if we do not interpret dark energy as vacuum energy. The key idea to…
If the reported measurements of the time variation of the fine structure constant from observations of distant QSOs are correct, combined with the Oklo limit they would strongly constrain the class of the quintessence potential. If these…
The Cosmic Defect theory has been confronted with four observational constraints: primordial nuclear species abundances emerging from the big bang nucleosynthesis; large scale structure formation in the universe; cosmic microwave background…
The role of the quintessence field as a probable candidate for the repulsive dark energy, the conditions for tracking and the requisites for tracker fields are examined. The concept of `integrated tracking' is introduced and a new criterion…
The possibility of reconstructing the dark energy equation of state from variations in the fine structure constant is investigated for a class of models where the quintessence field is non-minimally coupled to the electromagnetic field. For…
The problem of the cosmic coincidence is a longstanding puzzle. This conundrum may be solved by introducing a coupling between the two dark sectors. In this Letter, we study two cases of the coupled quintessence scenario. $(a)$ Assume that…
We explore the possibility that our universe's current accelerated expansion is explained by a quintessence model with an exponential scalar potential, $V =V_0\, e^{-\lambda\, \phi}$, keeping an eye towards $\lambda \geq \sqrt{2}$ and an…
Recent astronomical observations of SNIa, CMB, as well as BAO in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey, suggest that the current Universe has entered a stage of an accelerated expansion with the transition redshift at $z \simeq 0.5$. While the…