Related papers: Density perturbations in the Ekpyrotic Universe an…
We consider the construction of nonsingular Pre-Big-Bang and Ekpyrotic type cosmological models realized by the addition to the action of specific higher-order terms stemming from quantum corrections. We study models involving general…
We study the generation of density perturbations in the ekpyrotic scenario for the early universe, including gravitational backreaction. We expose interesting subtleties that apply to both inflationary and ekpyrotic models. Our analysis…
Cosmological models involving a bounce from a contracting to an expanding universe can address the standard cosmological puzzles and generate "primordial" density perturbations without the need for inflation. Some such models, in particular…
We describe a scenario for inflation in the framework of non-critical string theory, which does not employ an inflaton field. There is an exponential expansion of the volume of the Universe, induced by enormous entropy production in the…
If the linear perturbation theory is valid through the bounce, the surviving fluctuations from the ekpyrotic scenario (cyclic one as well) should have very blue spectra with suppressed amplitude for the scalar-type structure. We derive the…
We consider the evolution of scalar perturbations in a class of non-singular bouncing universes obtained with higher-order corrections to the low-energy bosonic string action. We show that previous studies have relied on a singular…
In this review, a number of approaches to superstring cosmology which make use of key features which distinguish string theory from point particle theories are discussed, with particular emphasis on emergent scenarios. One motivation for…
We develop the cosmological perturbations formalism in models with a single non-local scalar field originating from the string field theory description of the rolling tachyon dynamics. We construct the equation for the energy density…
We compute spectra of particles produced during a dilaton-driven kinetic inflation phase within string cosmology models. The resulting spectra depend on the parameters of the model and on the type of particle and are quite varied, some…
In string theory, the traditional picture of a Universe that emerges from the inflation of a very small and highly curved space-time patch is a possibility, not a necessity: quite different initial conditions are possible, and not…
We analyze a general mechanism for producing a nearly scale-invariant spectrum of cosmological curvature perturbations during a contracting phase preceding a big bang, that can be entirely described using 4d effective field theory. The…
The ekpyrotic and cyclic universe scenarios have revived the idea that the density perturbations apparent in today's universe could have been generated in a `pre-singularity' epoch before the big bang. These scenarios provide explicit…
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 complement the low-energy gravi-dilaton effective action of string theory with a non-local, general-covariant dilaton potential, and obtain homogeneous solutions describing a non-singular (bouncing-curvature) cosmology. We then compute,…
Brane inflation is a specific realization of the inflationary universe scenario in the early universe within the brane world framework in string theory. The naturalness and robustness of this realistic scenario is explained. Its predictions…
There is increasing evidence from string theory that effective field theories are only reliable over approximately sub-Planckian field excursions. The two most promising effective models for early universe cosmology, inflation and…
We discuss the generation and evolution of density perturbations during the large curvature phase of string cosmology. We find that perturbations in the scalar components of the metric evolve with cosmic time as $\exp (\gamma H_st)$ where…
We study cosmologies based on low-energy effective string theory with higher-order string corrections to a tree-level action and with a modulus scalar field (dilaton or compactification modulus). In the presence of such corrections it is…
We present a nonsingular bouncing cosmology using single scalar field matter with non-trivial potential and non-standard kinetic term. The potential sources a dynamical attractor solution with Ekpyrotic contraction which washes out small…
In this paper, we present a new scenario of the early Universe that contains a pre big bang Ekpyrotic phase. By combining this with a ghost condensate, the theory explicitly violates the null energy condition without developing any…