Related papers: Generating cosmological perturbations with mass va…
The early Universe after inflation may have oscillations, kinations (nonoscillatory evolution of a field), topological defects, relativistic and non-relativistic particles at the same time. The Universe whose energy density is a sum of…
The theory of cosmological perturbations has become a cornerstone of modern quantitative cosmology since it is the framework which provides the link between the models of the very early Universe such as the inflationary Universe scenario…
A short introduction to structure formation is given, followed by a discussion of the possible characteristics of the initial perturbations assuming a generic inflationary origin. Observational data related to large-scale structure and the…
In cosmological scenarios with thermal inflation, extra eras of moduli matter domination, thermal inflation and flaton matter domination exist between primordial inflation and the radiation domination of Big Bang nucleosynthesis. During…
Our Universe is ruled by quantum mechanics and its extension Quantum Field Theory (QFT). However, the explanations for a number of cosmological phenomena such as inflation, dark energy, symmetry breakings, and phase transitions need the…
Evolution of large-scale scalar perturbations in the presence of stiff solid (solid with pressure to energy density ratio > 1/3) is studied. If the solid dominated the dynamics of the universe long enough, the perturbations could end up…
After introducing gauge-invariant cosmological perturbation theory we give an improved set of governing equations for multiple fluids including energy transfer. Having defined adiabatic and entropic perturbations we derive the…
The density perturbations generated when the inflaton decay rate is perturbed by a light scalar field $\chi$ are studied. By explicitly solving the perturbation equations for the system of two scalar fields and radiation, we show that even…
Scalar fields with an energy density dominated by its kinetic part may have played a relevant role in the very early stages of the Universe. Compared to the standard inflationary paradigm, they may lead to modifications in observable…
The particle production process is reviewed, through which cosmic inflation can produce a scale invariant superhorizon spectrum of perturbations of suitable fields starting from their quantum fluctuations. Afterwards, in the context of the…
We study the cosmic density perturbations induced from fluctuation of the amplitude of late-decaying scalar condensations (called \phi) in the scenario where the scalar field \phi once dominates the universe. In such a scenario, the cosmic…
A calculation of the one-mode occupation numbers for vacuum fluctuations of massive fields in De Sitter space shows that their use for the generation of classical density perturbations in inflationary cosmology very much depends on their…
We discuss second-order cosmological perturbations on super-Hubble scales, in a scalar field dominated universe, such as during single field inflation. In this contest we show that the gauge-invariant curvature perturbations defined on…
We study the effect on the primordial cosmological perturbations of a sharp transition from inflationary to a radiation and matter dominated epoch respectively. We assume that the perturbations are generated by the vacuum fluctuations of a…
We propose a new mechanism to generate primordial curvature perturbations, based on the resonant production of particles during inflation. It is known that this phenomenon can trap the inflaton for a fraction of e-fold. This effect is…
In the standard inflationary paradigm, cosmological density perturbations are generated as quantum fluctuations in the early Universe, but then undergo a quantum-to-classical transition. A key role in this transition is played by squeezing…
Large curvature perturbations can source an observable amount of stochastic gravitational wave background (SGWB). We consider several scenarios where small-scale curvature perturbations are naturally enhanced due to the presence of…
A mechanism for generating metric perturbations in inflationary models is considered. Long-wavelength inhomogeneities of light scalar fields in a decoupled sector may give rise to superhorizon fluctuations of couplings and masses in the…
The ekpyrotic and cyclic universe scenarios have revived the idea that the density perturbations apparent in today's universe could have been generated in a `pre-singularity' epoch before the big bang. These scenarios provide explicit…
The formation of structure in the Universe offers some of the most powerful evidence in favour of the existence of dark matter in the Universe. We summarize recent work by ourselves and our collaborators, using linear and quasi-linear…