A Primer on the Physics of the Cosmic Microwave Background

A Primer on the Physics of the Cosmic Microwave Background

Author: Massimo Giovannini

Publisher: World Scientific

Published: 2008

Total Pages: 489

ISBN-13: 9812791434

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In the last fifteen years, various areas of high energy physics, astrophysics and theoretical physics have converged on the study of cosmology so that any graduate student in these disciplines today needs a reasonably self-contained introduction to the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB). This book presents the essential theoretical tools necessary to acquire a modern working knowledge of CMB physics. The style of the book, falling somewhere between a monograph and a set of lecture notes, is pedagogical and the author uses the typical approach of theoretical physics to explain the main problems in detail, touching on the main assumptions and derivations of a fascinating subject. Sample Chapter(s). Chapter 1: Why CMB Physics? (297 KB). Contents: Why CMB Physics?; From CMB to the Standard Cosmological Model; Problems with the SCM; SCM and Beyond; Essentials of Inflationary Dynamics; Inhomogeneities in FRW Models; The First Lap in CMB Anisotropies; Improved Fluid Description of Pre-Decoupling Physics; Kinetic Hierarchies; Early Initial Conditions?; Surfing on the Gauges; Interacting Fluids; Spectator Fields; Appendices: The Concept of Distance in Cosmology; Kinetic Description of Hot Plasmas; Scalar Modes of the Geometry; Metric Fluctuations: Gauge Independent Treatment. Readership: PhD students and researchers in physics, astrophysics and astronomy.


Relativistic Astrophysics and Cosmology

Relativistic Astrophysics and Cosmology

Author: Peter Hoyng

Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media

Published: 2007-01-10

Total Pages: 295

ISBN-13: 1402045239

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Relativistic Astrophysics and Cosmology offers a succinct and self-contained treatment of general relativity and its application to compact objects, gravitational waves and cosmology. The required mathematical concepts are introduced informally, following geometrical intuition as much as possible. The approach is theoretical, but there is ample discussion of observational aspects and of instrumental issues where appropriate. The book includes such topical issues as the Gravity Probe B mission, interferometer detectors of gravitational waves, and the physics behind the angular power spectrum of the cosmic microwave background (CMB). Written for advanced undergraduates and beginning graduate students in (astro)physics, it is ideally suited for a lecture course and contains 140 exercises with extensive hints. The reader is assumed to be familiar with linear algebra and analysis, ordinary differential equations, special relativity, and basic thermal physics.


Introduction To The Theory Of The Early Universe: Cosmological Perturbations And Inflationary Theory

Introduction To The Theory Of The Early Universe: Cosmological Perturbations And Inflationary Theory

Author: Valery A Rubakov

Publisher: World Scientific

Published: 2011-02-10

Total Pages: 504

ISBN-13: 9814390615

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This book accompanies another book by the same authors, and presents the theory of the evolution of density perturbations and relic gravity waves, theory of cosmological inflation and post-inflationary reheating. Written in a pedagogical style, the main chapters give a detailed account of the established theory, with derivation of formulas. Being self-contained, it is a useful textbook for advanced undergraduate students and graduate students. Essential materials from General Relativity, theory of Gaussian random fields and quantum field theory are collected in the appendices. The more advanced topics are approached similarly in a pedagogical way. These parts may serve as a detailed introduction to current research.


Fundamental Physics and Physics Education Research

Fundamental Physics and Physics Education Research

Author: Burra G. Sidharth

Publisher: Springer Nature

Published: 2020-11-11

Total Pages: 289

ISBN-13: 3030529231

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This book highlights selected contributions presented at the 15th annual international symposium Frontiers of Fundamental Physics (FFP15), with the aim of informing readers about the most important recent advances in fundamental physics and physics education research. The FFP series offers a platform for physicists from around the world to present their latest theories and findings. The latest symposium was held in Orihuela, Spain and covered diverse fields of research, including gravitation, astronomy and astrophysics, physics of complex systems, high-energy physics, and mathematical physics. Considerable attention was also paid to physics education research, teacher education in physics, and the popularization of physics. In a knowledge-based society, research into fundamental physics plays a vital role in both the advancement of human knowledge and the development of new technologies. Presenting valuable new peer-reviewed contributions submitted from 15 countries, this book will appeal to a broad audience of scholars and researchers.


The Little Book of Cosmology

The Little Book of Cosmology

Author: Lyman Page

Publisher: Princeton University Press

Published: 2020-04-07

Total Pages: 138

ISBN-13: 0691201692

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The cutting-edge science that is taking the measure of the universe The Little Book of Cosmology provides a breathtaking look at our universe on the grandest scales imaginable. Written by one of the world's leading experimental cosmologists, this short but deeply insightful book describes what scientists are revealing through precise measurements of the faint thermal afterglow of the Big Bang—known as the cosmic microwave background, or CMB—and how their findings are transforming our view of the cosmos. Blending the latest findings in cosmology with essential concepts from physics, Lyman Page first helps readers to grasp the sheer enormity of the universe, explaining how to understand the history of its formation and evolution in space and time. Then he sheds light on how spatial variations in the CMB formed, how they reveal the age, size, and geometry of the universe, and how they offer a blueprint for the formation of cosmic structure. Not only does Page explain current observations and measurements, he describes how they can be woven together into a unified picture to form the Standard Model of Cosmology. Yet much remains unknown, and this incisive book also describes the search for ever deeper knowledge at the field's frontiers—from quests to understand the nature of neutrinos and dark energy to investigations into the physics of the very early universe.


The Cosmic Microwave Background

The Cosmic Microwave Background

Author: Ruth Durrer

Publisher:

Published: 2008

Total Pages: 401

ISBN-13: 9781107175624

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Graduate textbook examining the theory of the cosmic microwave background and its recent progress.


Vignettes In Gravitation And Cosmology

Vignettes In Gravitation And Cosmology

Author: Lakshmanan Sriramkumar

Publisher: World Scientific

Published: 2012-03-20

Total Pages: 284

ISBN-13: 981446421X

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This book comprises expository articles on different aspects of gravitation and cosmology that are aimed at graduate students. The topics discussed are of contemporary interest assuming only an elementary introduction to gravitation and cosmology. The presentations are to a certain extent pedagogical in nature, and the material developed is not usually found in sufficient detail in recent textbooks in these areas.


Relic Gravitons

Relic Gravitons

Author: Massimo Giovannini

Publisher: World Scientific

Published: 2024-02-27

Total Pages: 827

ISBN-13: 9811278873

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Relic Gravitons delves into the cosmic backgrounds of stochastic gravitational waves, exploring their potential as a unique source of information on the early physical conditions of the Universe close to the Planck epoch. Drawing on various lecture notes, articles, and reviews since the early 1990s, the monograph presents a topical account of the subject. The aim is to offer students and practitioners a useful tool for understanding the most recent developments of a lively field that is now thriving also thanks to forthcoming observational data.While the detection of diffuse backgrounds of gravitational radiation might improve current bounds on the supplementary polarizations of gravitational waves, the author explores across the sixteen chapters of the monograph the sensitivity of cosmic gravitons to the new physics beyond the standard lore of fundamental interactions. It is argued that the discovery of relic gravitons may trigger a paradigm shift whose implications are yet to be fully understood.In different respects, the physics of relic gravitons bridges the microworld of the standard model of fundamental interactions with the macroworld of gravity and cosmology. The ultimate purpose of this book is then to provide, at once, a systematic and self-contained presentation which is still sorely lacking in the current literature.


Fifteenth Marcel Grossmann Meeting, The: On Recent Developments In Theoretical And Experimental General Relativity, Astrophysics, And Relativistic Field Theories - Proceedings Of The Mg15 Meeting On General Relativity (In 3 Volumes)

Fifteenth Marcel Grossmann Meeting, The: On Recent Developments In Theoretical And Experimental General Relativity, Astrophysics, And Relativistic Field Theories - Proceedings Of The Mg15 Meeting On General Relativity (In 3 Volumes)

Author: Elia S Battistelli

Publisher: World Scientific

Published: 2022-05-10

Total Pages: 2281

ISBN-13: 9811258260

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The three volumes of the proceedings of MG15 give a broad view of all aspects of gravitational physics and astrophysics, from mathematical issues to recent observations and experiments. The scientific program of the meeting included 40 morning plenary talks over 6 days, 5 evening popular talks and nearly 100 parallel sessions on 71 topics spread over 4 afternoons. These proceedings are a representative sample of the very many oral and poster presentations made at the meeting.Part A contains plenary and review articles and the contributions from some parallel sessions, while Parts B and C consist of those from the remaining parallel sessions. The contents range from the mathematical foundations of classical and quantum gravitational theories including recent developments in string theory, to precision tests of general relativity including progress towards the detection of gravitational waves, and from supernova cosmology to relativistic astrophysics, including topics such as gamma ray bursts, black hole physics both in our galaxy and in active galactic nuclei in other galaxies, and neutron star, pulsar and white dwarf astrophysics. Parallel sessions touch on dark matter, neutrinos, X-ray sources, astrophysical black holes, neutron stars, white dwarfs, binary systems, radiative transfer, accretion disks, quasars, gamma ray bursts, supernovas, alternative gravitational theories, perturbations of collapsed objects, analog models, black hole thermodynamics, numerical relativity, gravitational lensing, large scale structure, observational cosmology, early universe models and cosmic microwave background anisotropies, inhomogeneous cosmology, inflation, global structure, singularities, chaos, Einstein-Maxwell systems, wormholes, exact solutions of Einstein's equations, gravitational waves, gravitational wave detectors and data analysis, precision gravitational measurements, quantum gravity and loop quantum gravity, quantum cosmology, strings and branes, self-gravitating systems, gamma ray astronomy, cosmic rays and the history of general relativity.