Related papers: Why is the CMB fluctuation level 10^{-5}?
Fluctuations in the cosmic microwave background (CMB) temperature are being studied with ever increasing precision. Two competing types of theories might describe the origins of these fluctuations: ``inflation'' and ``defects''. Here we…
We propose a new source for the cosmological density perturbation which is passive fluctuations of the inflaton driven dynamically by a colored quantum noise as a result of its coupling to other massive quantum fields. The created…
CMB anisotropy data could put powerful constraints on theories of the evolution of our Universe. Using the observations of the large number of CMB experiments, many studies have put constraints on cosmological parameters assuming different…
Light scalar fields very naturally appear in modern cosmological models, affecting such parameters of Standard Model as electromagnetic fine structure constant $\alpha$, dimensionless ratios of electron or quark mass to the QCD scale,…
This article discusses density perturbations in inflationary models, offering a pedagogical description of how these perturbations are generated by quantum fluctuations in the early universe. A key feature of inflation is that that rapid…
Primordial gravitational waves (GWs) with frequencies > 10^{-15} Hz contribute to the radiation density of the Universe at the time of decoupling of the cosmic microwave background (CMB). The effects of this GW background on the CMB and…
The cosmic curvature $\Omega_{K}$ is an important parameter related to the inflationary cosmology and the ultimate fate of the universe. In this work, we adopt the non-CMB observations to constrain $\Omega_{K}$ in the $\Lambda$CDM model and…
Non-linear evolution of cosmological energy density fluctuations triggers deviations from Gaussianity in the temperature distribution of the cosmic microwave background. A method to estimate these deviations is proposed. N-body simulations…
We were asked to debate the value of the cosmological mass-density parameter Omega. Is Omega_m=1 in accordance with the simplest model? Is Omega_m much smaller as indicated by some observations? There is conflicting evidence. We lay out the…
The COBE detection of microwave anisotropies provides the best way of fixing the amplitude of cosmological fluctuations on the largest scales. We discuss the impact of this new, precise normalization and give fitting formulae for the…
The past, present and future of cosmic microwave background (CMB) anisotropy research is discussed, with emphasis on the Boomerang and Maxima balloon experiments. These data are combined with large scale structure (LSS) information and high…
In the present work, we consider the cosmological constant model $\Lambda\propto\alpha^{-6}$, which is well motivated from three independent approaches. As is well known, the hint of varying fine structure constant $\alpha$ was found in…
A hypothetical dark energy component may have an equation of state that is different from a cosmological constant and possibly even changing in time. The spacing of the cosmic microwave background peaks is sensitive to the ratio of the…
We find that current Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) anisotropy data strongly constrain the mean spatial curvature of the Universe to be near zero, or, equivalently, the total energy density to be near critical-as predicted by inflation.…
Low amplitude (linear regime) cosmic density fluctuations lead to spatial variations in the locally measurable value of $H_0$ (denoted as $H_L$), $\delta_H \equiv (H_L-H_0)/H_0$, which are of order 3-6% (95% confidence interval) in a sphere…
The current enthusiam to measure fluctuations in the CMB power spectrum at angular scales between 0.1 and 1 degree is largely motivated by the expectation that CMB determinations of cosmological parameters will be of unprecedented…
A simple model of uniformly expanding, homogeneous Universe with a bulk viscosity is studied wherein the inflationary density decays due to viscous dissipation during the expansion phase of the Universe. The model is shown to generate the…
Observations show that the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) contains tiny variations at the 10^{-5} level around its black-body equilibrium temperature. The detection of these temperature fluctuations provides to modern Cosmology evidence…
How much can we know about our Universe? All of our observations are restricted to a finite volume, and therefore our estimates of presumably global cosmological parameters are necessarily based on incomplete information. Even assuming that…
We put robust upper limits on the average cosmological density \Omega_s of cosmic strings based on the variability properties of a large homogeneous sample of SDSS quasars. We search for an excess of characteristic variations of quasar…