Related papers: Decaying $\Lambda$ cosmologies and statistical pro…
We study a uniform and isotropic cosmology with a decaying vacuum energy density, in the realm of a model with a time varying gravitational "constant". We show that, for late times, such a cosmology is in accordance with the observed values…
In these lectures I give an overview of gravitational lensing, concentrating on theoretical aspects, including derivations of some of the important results. Topics covered include the determination of surface mass densities of intervening…
The cosmological constant, i.e., the energy density stored in the true vacuum state of all existing fields in the Universe, is the simplest and the most natural possibility to describe the current cosmic acceleration. However, despite its…
We analyze cosmography as a tool to constrain modified gravity theories. We take four distinct models and obtain their parameters in terms of the cosmographic parameters favored by observational data of strong gravitational lensing. We…
The orbital Lense-Thirring precession is considered in the context of constraints for weak-field General Relativity involving the cosmological constant $\Lambda$. It is shown that according to the current accuracy of satellite measurements…
Gravitational lenses can provide crucial information on the geometry of the Universe, on the cosmological scenario of formation of its structures as well as on the history of its components with look-back time. In this review, I focus on…
Some aspects of gravitational lensing by large scale structure (LSS) are investigated. We show that lensing causes the damping tail of the cosmic microwave background (CMB) power spectrum to fall less rapidly with decreasing angular scale…
Observations of galaxy-scale strong gravitational lensing systems enable unique tests of departures from general relativity at the kpc-Mpc scale. In this work, the gravitational slip parameter $\gamma_{\rm PN}$, measuring the amplitude of a…
We present the results of weak gravitational lensing statistics in four different cosmological $N$-body simulations. The data has been generated using an algorithm for the three-dimensional shear, which makes use of a variable softening…
The accelerated expansion of the Universe remains one of the central open problems in modern cosmology. While the $\Lambda$CDM model successfully describes a wide range of observations, the physical nature of dark energy is still unknown,…
Gravitational lensing is now widely and successfully used to study a range of astronomical phenomena, from individual objects, like galaxies and clusters, to the mass distribution on various scales, to the overall geometry of the Universe.…
We use Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) observations together with the Red-sequence Cluster Survey (RCS) weak lensing results to derive constraints on a range of cosmological parameters. This particular choice of observations is motivated…
A Simpson-Visser spacetime has two nonnegative parameters $a$ and $m$ and its metric is correspond with (i) a Schwarzschild metric for $a=0$ and $m\neq0$, (ii) a regular black hole metric for $a<2m$, (iii) a one-way traversable wormhole…
We study the redshift distribution of two samples of early-type gravitational lenses, extracted from a larger collection of 122 systems, to constrain the cosmological constant in the LCDM model and the parameters of a set of alternative…
We explore the implications of gravitationally lensed QSOs and high-redshift SNe Ia observations for spatially flat cosmological models in which a classically evolving scalar field currently dominates the energy density of the Universe. We…
The possibility of determining cosmological parameters on the basis of a wide set of observational data including the Abell-ACO cluster power spectrum and mass function, peculiar velocities of galaxies, the distribution of Ly-$\alpha$…
We investigate observational constraints from present and future supernova data on a large class of decaying vacuum cosmologies. In such scenarios the present value of the vacuum energy density is quantified by a positive $\beta$ parameter…
The purpose of these lecture notes is to describe the gravitational lens effects in different astrophysical contexts. These notes are voluntarily focused on the fundamental mechanisms and the basic concepts that are useful to describe these…
The self-accelerating braneworld model (DGP) seems to provide a simple alternative to the the standard $\Lambda$CDM cosmology to explain the current cosmic acceleration, which is strongly indicated by measurements of Type Ia supernovae, as…
The light we observe from distant astrophysical objects including supernovae and quasars allows us to determine large distances in terms of a cosmological model. Despite the success of the standard cosmological model in fitting the data,…