Particle Physics and Cosmology: The Interface

Introduces the experimental and theoretical particle physics background underlying several aspects of cosmology: matter anti-matter asymmetry, dark matter, the acceleration of the expansion, the 3K Cosmological Background Radiation, the geometry of the universe.

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This Carg' ese school of Particle physics is meant to bridge the narr- ing gap between astrophysical observations and particle physics. The lectures supply the students with a theoretical background which covers severalaspectsofthecosmologicalscenario: matter-antimatterasym- try, the nature of dark matter, the acceleration of the expansion and the cosmological constant and the geometry of the universe as well as m- ernviewsonparticlephysicsincludingsupersymmetry, extradimensions scenarii and neutrino oscillations. ix Preface TheinvestigationofnuclearabundancesbyAlpher,Bethe,andGamow (1948) was the ?rst intrusion of subatomic physics into cosmology. In contrast with their assumption, most nuclear species are now known to be produced in stars, but their bold step led to predictions which have largely been proven to be right: -a crude estimate of the densities during primordial nucleosynthesis -the presence of a residual 3K radiation today. the issues they addressed are still relevant. The origin of matter is not fully understood,and the CMB has grown into a powerful tool to inv- tigate the early eras of the universe.
The progress of cosmological observations has now led to a 'standard' slow-roll in?ation model, which accounts quantitatively for many - served features of the universe. As the lectures will show, it still leaves large unchartered areas, and the underlying particle physics aspects are yettobeelucidated.