Related papers: Minimal Noncanonical Cosmologies
We consider inflation in a universe with a positive cosmological constant and a nonminimally coupled scalar field, in which the field couples both quadratically and quartically to the Ricci scalar. When considered in the Einstein frame and…
We consider a charged leptophilic extension of the Standard Model of particle physics as a minimal dark sector. It accomodates a WIMP paradigm at the TeV-scale that is sufficient to solve all small-scale problems of $\Lambda$CDM and explain…
The early stages of the universe evolution are discussed according to the hot big bang model and the grand unified theories. The shortcomings of big bang are summarized and their resolution by inflationary cosmology is sketched.…
Recent results from cosmic microwave background (CMB) experiments verify several of the predictions of inflation, while ruling out a number of alternative structure-formation scenarios. Given the successes of the theory, the obvious next…
The existence of the inflationary era in the early Universe seems to be strongly supported by recent CMB observations. However, only a few realistic inflation scenarios which have close relation to particle physics seem to have been known…
I review two cosmological paradigms which are alternative to the current inflationary scenario. The first alternative is the "matter bounce", a non-singular bouncing cosmology with a matter-dominated phase of contraction. The second is an…
Since this is a meeting on inflation the title of this talk should probably have been ``The cosmos as a lab for inflation''. I will illustrate how, by combining WMAP observations of the cosmic microwave background (CMB) with smaller scales…
A scenario with two subsequent periods of inflationary expansion in the very early universe is examined. The model is based on a potential motivated by symmetries being found in field theory at high energy. For various parameter sets of the…
We explore a cosmological model in which dark matter is non-minimally coupled to gravity at the fluid level. While typically subdominant compared to Standard Model forces, such couplings may dominate dark matter dynamics. We show that this…
We use the physically-consistent tilted spatially-flat and untilted non-flat $\Lambda$CDM inflation models to constrain cosmological parameter values with the Planck 2015 cosmic microwave background (CMB) anisotropy data and recent Type Ia…
I review the general aspects of cosmological parameter estimation from observations of the cosmic microwave background (CMB) temperature anisotropies in the framework of inflationary adiabatic models. The most recent CMB datasets are…
We investigate the impact of a non-minimal coupling of the scalar field with gravity in inflationary models, where a small coupling is allowed. As a concrete example, we consider the Witten-O'Raifeartaigh model, where, in line with other…
We found general solutions of matter stress-energy (non-)conservation in scalar-tensor FLRW-type cosmological models by extending the logotropic formalism to the case of non-minimal coupling between the scalar field and new dark fluid…
We exploit the complementarity among supersymmetry, inflation, axions, Big Bang Nucleosynthesis (BBN) and Cosmic Microwave Background Radiation (CMB) to constrain supersymmetric axion models in the light of the recent Planck and BICEP…
The Universe is neither homogeneous nor isotropic, but it is close enough that we can reasonably approximate it as such on suitably large scales. The inflationary-$\Lambda$-Cold Dark Matter ($\Lambda$CDM) concordance cosmology builds on…
Conventional scenarios of purely gravitationally produced dark matter with masses below the Hubble parameter at the end of inflation are in tension with Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) constraints on the isocurvature power spectrum. We…
We propose a model for early universe cosmology without the need for fundamental scalar fields. Cosmic acceleration and phenomenologically viable reheating of the universe results from a series of energy transitions, where during each…
Present-day extragalactic observations are mostly rather well-modelled by a general-relativistic model, the $\Lambda$ CDM model. The model appears to surpass the limits of known physics by requiring that the Universe be dominated by "dark…
We consider a minimal supersymmetric extension of the Standard Model, with right-handed neutrinos and local B-L, the difference between baryon and lepton number, a symmetry which is spontaneously broken at the scale of grand unification. To…
The results from Planck2015, when combined with earlier observations from WMAP, ACT, SPT and other experiments, were the first observations to disfavor the "classic" inflationary paradigm. To satisfy the observational constraints,…