Related papers: Cosmic Defects
Cosmological inflation and topological defects have been considered for a long time, either in disagreement or in competition. On the one hand an inflationary era is required to solve the shortcomings of the hot big bang model, while on the…
Structure formation with topological defects is described. The main differences from inflationary models are highlighted. The results are compared with recent observations. It is concluded that all the defect models studied so far are in…
Topological defects may play the role of the curvatons. We propose a new mechanism of generating density perturbations from cosmological defects in inflationary models. We show several examples in which defects play crucial role in…
Many particle physics models of matter admit solutions corresponding to stable or long-lived topological defects. In the context of standard cosmology it is then unavoidable that such defects will form during phase transitions in the very…
Topological defects are produced during phase transitions in the very early Universe. They arise in most unified theories of strong, weak and electromagnetic interactions. These lectures focus on the role of topological defects in…
The potential role of cosmic topological defects has raised interest in the astrophysical community for many years now. In this set of notes, we give an introduction to the subject of cosmic topological defects and some of their possible…
Modern cosmology provides a connection between the physics of particles and fields and observational cosmology. Making use of this link, a wealth of new observational data can be utilized to explore and constrain theories of fundamental…
Topological defects are ubiquitous in condensed-matter physics but only hypothetical in the early universe. In spite of this, even an indirect evidence for one of these cosmic objects would revolutionize our vision of the cosmos. We give…
Topological defects are ubiquitous in physics. Whenever a symmetry breaking phase transition occurs, topological defects may form. The best known examples are vortex lines in type II super conductors or in liquid Helium, and declination…
Topological defects are involved in a plethora of physical and astrophysical phenomena. In these lectures, I will review the r\^ ole they could play in the large-scale structure formation and the anisotropies of the cosmic microwave…
We provide a pedagogical overview of defect models of structure formation. We first introduce the concept of topological defect, and describe how to classify them. We then show how defects might be produced in phase transitions in the Early…
In the context of supersymmetric models, we analyze the production of topological defects at the end of inflation driven by a conjugate pair of inflaton fields which are non-singlets under the continuous symmetry group of the theory. We…
Topological defects, in particular cosmic strings, give rise to an interesting mechanism for generating the primordial perturbations in the early Universe which are required to explain the present structure. An overview of the cosmic string…
A wide class of inflationary models, known as Hybrid Inflation models, may produce topological defects during a phase transition at the end of the inflationary epoch. We point out that, if the energy scale of these defects is close to that…
The topology of space is usually assumed simply connected, but could be multi-connected. We review in the latter case the possibility that topological defects arising at high energy phase transitions might still be present and find that…
An introduction to topological defects in cosmology is given. We discuss their possible relevance for structure formation. Especial emphasis is given on the signature of topological defects in the spectrum of anisotropies in the cosmic…
Current theories of particle physics lead to the unavoidable conclusion that there must have been several phase transitions in the early universe. Further, in the context of these theories, it is possible that cosmological phase transitions…
Topological defects can be formed during inflation by phase transitions as well as by quantum nucleation. We study the effect of the expansion of the Universe on the internal structure of the defects. We look for stationary solutions to the…
I present a briefly summary of the current status of inflationary models versus topological defects scenarios, as the mechanisms which could have induced the initial density perturbations, which left an imprint on the cosmic microwave…
Hybrid inflation within supersymmetric grand unified theories, as well as inflation through brane collisions within braneworld cosmological models, lead to the formation of one-dimensional defects. Observational data, mainly from the cosmic…