Related papers: An introduction to cosmological inflation
This thesis is dedicated to the study of inflationary scenarios based on string theory. Inflation is a brief period of accelerated expansion in the very early Universe which gives natural explanations for problems of the Standard Big Bang…
We perform a general analysis of the cosmological viability of Geometric Inflation. We show that the evolution of the universe, from inflation to the present day, can be seen from the addition of an infinite tower of curvature invariants…
We develop a possible cosmology for a Universe with n additional spatial dimensions of variable scale, and an associated scalar field, the radion, which is distinct from the field responsible for inflation, the inflaton. Based on a…
A unified description of inflation, dark energy, and dark matter is presented within a two-scalar-field cosmological model. Inflation, assumed to be of the warm type, is driven by one of the scalar fields, which, shortly after the end of…
The changes of main paradigms on the structure and evolution of the Universe are reviewed. Two puzzles of the modern cosmology, the mean density of matter and the regularity of the Universe on large scales, as well as the possibility to…
It has been known for some time that the usual inference drawn from the observed near-flatness of the large-scale Universe - namely the existence of a cosmological "flatness problem", which is then taken as a partial, but key motivation for…
This is a personal account of the early work that led to what is now known as the ``preheating stage" of inflationary cosmology. The broader applicability of the underlying instability mechanisms in cosmology are indicated.
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…
Inflation is considered as the best theory of the early universe by a very large fraction of cosmologists. However, the validity of a scientific model is not decided by counting the number of its supporters and, therefore, this dominance…
We consider the fate of the observable universe in the light of the discovery of a dark energy component to the cosmic energy budget. We extend results for a cosmological constant to a general dark energy component and examine the…
Cosmological inflation is not the only early universe scenario consistent with current observational data. I will discuss the criteria for a successful early universe cosmology, compare a couple of the proposed scenarios (inflation,…
In a series of five lectures I review inflationary cosmology. I begin with a description of the initial conditions problems of the Friedmann-Robertson-Walker (FRW) cosmology and then explain how inflation, an early period of accelerated…
We provide a realisation of a singularity-free inflationary universe in the form of a simple cosmological model dominated at early times by a single minimally coupled scalar field with a physically based potential. The universe starts…
Extended inflation is a promising new approach to implementing the inflationary universe scenario. This paper reviews recent advances including a new, more robust mechanism for ending extended inflation, a new prediction for the density…
The description of the accelerated phases for the current and primordial cosmos has been obtained in the framework of R\'{e}nyi cosmology. The results show that corrections to the Friedmann equations, originated from differences between…
There exists a growing body of observational evidence supporting a non-vanishing cosmological constant at the present epoch. We examine the possibility that such a term may arise directly from the potential energy which drove an…
Here $f(R)$-cosmology is discussed using a different approach. This model explains early-inflation, emergence of cosmic background radiation at the exit from inflation, cosmic deceleration during radiation-dominance followed by deceleration…
In a unified picture both inflation and present dynamical dark energy arise from the same scalar field. The history of the Universe describes a crossover from a scale invariant "past fixed point" where all particles are massless, to a…
The understanding of the primordial mechanism that seeded the cosmic structures we observe today in the sky is one of the major goals in cosmology. The leading paradigm for such a mechanism is provided by the inflationary scenario, a period…
This article gives a brief overview of the status of attempts to constrain inflation using observations, and examines prospects for future developments.