Related papers: Is the vacuum stable?
In the thin-wall approximation, the decay of a gravitating false vacuum to a lower-energy state is affected by the cosmological horizon structure in both spaces. The nucleation radius of a bubble of true vacuum depends on the surface…
In the present days of modern cosmology it is assumed that the main ingredient to cosmic energy presently is vacuum energy with an energy density $\epsilon_\mathrm{vac}$ that is constant over the cosmic evolution. In this paper here we…
The inflaton is highly likely to settle in a squeezed vacuum state after inflation. The relic inflaton after inflation and reheating undergoes a damped oscillatory motion and contributes to the effective cosmological constant. We interpret…
In this year, in which we celebrate 100 years of the cosmological term, $\Lambda$, in Einstein's gravitational field equations, we are still facing the crucial question whether $\Lambda$ is truly a fundamental constant or a mildly evolving…
We are at a specific period of modern cosmology, during which the large increase of the amount of data leads to the idea that the determination of cosmological parameters has been achieved with a rather good precision. There is a large…
Motivated by the stability of the electroweak Higgs vacuum we consider the possibility that the Standard Model might work up to large scales between about $10^{10}$ GeV and close to the Planck scale. A plausible scenario is an emergent…
The universe appears to be accelerating, but the reason why is a complete mystery. The simplest explanation, a small vacuum energy (cosmological constant), raises three difficult issues: why the vacuum energy is so small, why it is not…
In general, the laws of physics are not invariant under a change of scale. To find out whether the 'scale-invariance hypothesis' corresponds to nature or not, a careful examination to its implications is required. As a consequence, the…
While the simple picture of a spatially flat, matter plus cosmological constant universe fits current observation of the accelerated expansion, strong consideration has also been given to models with dynamical vacuum energy. We examine the…
A new mechanism of adjustment of vacuum energy down to the observed value from an initially huge one is considered. The mechanism is based on a very strong variation of the gravitational coupling constant in very early universe. The model…
The cosmological constant term can be seen as a constant potential for a (scalar) field. In this viewpoint, at late times, the field is stopped rolling and behaves as a cosmological constant ($w=-1$). While at the early universe, its…
Stability of the Einstein static universe versus the linear scalar, vector and tensor perturbations is investigated in the context of deformed Ho\v{r}ava-Lifshitz cosmology inspired by entropic force scenario. A general stability condition…
Bouncing models have been proposed by many authors as a completion, or even as an alternative to inflation for the description of the very early and dense Universe. However, most bouncing models contain a contracting phase from a very large…
Despite the many efforts, our theoretical understanding of the ultimate nature of the dark energy component of the universe still lags well behind the astounding experimental evidence achieved from the increasingly sophisticated…
We advance the viewpoint that only relevant modes of the vacuum fluctuations, namely, with wavelengths conditioned by the size, homogeneity, geometry and topology of the Universe, do contribute into the cosmological constant. A formula is…
A variety of observations indicate that the universe is dominated by dark energy with negative pressure, one possibility for which is a cosmological constant. If the dark energy is a cosmological constant, a fundamental question is: Why has…
We present an alternative scheme for an Emergent Universe scenario, developed previously in $Phys.\ Rev.\ D {\bf 86}, 083524 (2012)$, where the universe is initially in a static state supported by a scalar field located in a false vacuum.…
The present discussion contribution is some remarks concerning and review of the proposal by one of us (C. Balazs) to explain the cosmological constant by a/the principle of entropy. Used without further comment this principle of entropy…
We review the cosmological evidence for a low matter density universe and a cosmological constant or dynamical vacuum energy and address the cosmolog$ coincidence problem: why is the matter density about one-half the vacuum energy {\em…
The existence and stability conditions of Einstein static universe against homogeneous scalar perturbations in the context of Lyra geometry is investigated. The stability condition is obtained in terms of the constant equation of state…