This book provides a pedagogical introduction to the rapidly growing field of reheating after inflation. It begins with a brief review of the inflationary paradigm and a motivation for why the reheating of the universe is an integral part of inflationary cosmology. It then goes on to survey different aspects of reheating in a chronological manner, starting from the young, empty and cold universe at the end of inflation, and going all the way to the hot and thermal universe at the beginning of the Big Bang nucleosynthesis epoch. Different particle production mechanisms are considered with a focus on the non-perturbative excitation of scalar fields at the beginning of reheating (fermionic and vector fields are also discussed). This is followed by a review of the subsequent non-linear dynamical processes, such as soliton formation and relativistic turbulence. Various thermalization processes are also discussed. High energy physics embeddings of phenomenological models as well as observational implications of reheating such as gravitational waves generation and imprints on the cosmic microwave background are also covered.

This book provides a pedagogical introduction to the rapidly growing field of reheating after inflation. It begins with a brief review of the inflationary paradigm and a motivation for why the reheating of the universe is an integral part of inflationary cosmology. It then goes on to survey different aspects of reheating in a chronological manner, starting from the young, empty and cold universe at the end of inflation, and going all the way to the hot and thermal universe at the beginning of the Big Bang nucleosynthesis epoch. Different particle production mechanisms are considered with a focus on the non-perturbative excitation of scalar fields at the beginning of reheating (fermionic and vector fields are also discussed). This is followed by a review of the subsequent non-linear dynamical processes, such as soliton formation and relativistic turbulence. Various thermalization processes are also discussed. High energy physics embeddings of phenomenological models as well as observational implications of reheating such as gravitational waves generation and imprints on the cosmic microwave background are also covered.

This book provides a comprehensive and instructive coverage of particle physics in the early universe, in a logical way. It starts from the thermal history of the universe by investigating some of the main arguments such as Big Bang nucleosynthesis, the cosmic microwave background (CMB) and the inflation, before treating in details the direct and indirect detection of dark matter and then some aspects of the physics of neutrino. Following, it describes possible candidates for dark matter and its interactions. The book is targeted at theoretical physicists who deal with particle physics in the universe, dark matter detection and astrophysical constraints, and at particle physicists who are interested in models of inflation or reheating. This book offers also material for astrophysicists who work with quantum field theory computations. All that is useful to compute any physical process is included: mathematical tables, all the needed functions for the thermodynamics of early universe and Feynman rules. In light of this, this book acts as a crossroad between astrophysics, particle physics and cosmology.

A monograph on inflationary cosmology and cosmological phase transitions, investigating modern cosmology's relationship to elementary particle physics. This work also includes a non-technical discussion of inflationary cosmology for those unfamiliar with the theory.

The past two decades have seen transformative advances in cosmology and string theory. Observations of the cosmic microwave background have revealed strong evidence for inflationary expansion in the very early universe, while new insights about compactifications of string theory have led to a deeper understanding of inflation in a framework that unifies quantum mechanics and general relativity. Written by two of the leading researchers in the field, this complete and accessible volume provides a modern treatment of inflationary cosmology and its connections to string theory and elementary particle theory. After an up-to-date experimental summary, the authors present the foundations of effective field theory, string theory, and string compactifications, setting the stage for a detailed examination of models of inflation in string theory. Three appendices contain background material in geometry and cosmological perturbation theory, making this a self-contained resource for graduate students and researchers in string theory, cosmology, and related fields.

This book gives an accessible account of the history of the Universe; not only what happened, but why it happened. An author of textbooks on the early Universe and inflation, David Lyth now explains both cosmology and the underlying physics to the general reader. The book includes a detailed account of the almost imperceptible structure in the early Universe, and its probable origin as a quantum fluctuation during an early epoch known as the epoch of inflation. It also explains how that early structure is visible now in the cosmic microwave radiation which is our main source of information about the early Universe, and how it gave rise to galaxies and stars. The main text of the book assumes no knowledge of mathematics or physics so that it is accessible to everybody, while an appendix contains more advanced material. As a result the book will be useful for a wide spectrum of readers, including high-school students, undergraduates, postgraduates and professional physicists working in areas other than cosmology. It will also serve as “additional reading” for university courses in general astronomy, astrophysics or cosmology itself.

A thorough and up-to-date graduate textbook on the most promising theory of the universe - inflationary cosmology.