Model-independent constraints on modified gravity models hitherto exist mainly on linear scales[1]. A recently developed formalism presented a consistent parameterisation that is valid on all scales[2]. Using this approach, we perform model-independent modified gravity N-body simulations on all cosmological scales with a time-dependent μ. We present convergence tests of our simulations, and we examine

In this work, we use a combined approach of Hubble parameter data together with redshift-space-distortion (fσ8) data, which together are used to reconstruct the teleparallel gravity (TG) Lagrangian via Gaussian processes (GP). The adopted Hubble data mainly comes from cosmic chronometers, while for the Type Ia supernovae data we use the latest jointly calibrated Pantheon compilation. Moreover, we consider

The generalised Proca (GP) theory is a modified gravity model in which the acceleration of the cosmic expansion rate can be explained by self interactions of a cosmological vector field. In this paper we study a particular sub-class of the GP theory, with up to cubic order Lagrangian, known as the cubic vector Galileon (cvG) model. This model is similar to the cubic scalar Galileon (csG) in many aspects

We study the detailed process by which slow contraction smooths and flattens the universe using an improved numerical relativity code that accepts initial conditions with non-perturbative deviations from homogeneity and isotropy along two independent spatial directions. Contrary to common descriptions of the early universe, we find that the geometry first rapidly converges to an inhomogeneous, spatially-curved

The observed temperature fluctuations in the cosmic microwave background can be traced back to primordial curvature modes that are sourced by adiabatic and/or entropic matter perturbations. In this paper, we explore the entropic mechanism in the context of non-singular bouncing cosmologies. We show that curvature modes are naturally generated during `graceful exit,' i.e., when the smoothing slow contraction

We study the impact of thermalization and number-changing processes in the dark sector on the yield of gravitationally produced dark matter (DM). We take into account the DM production through the s-channel exchange of a massless graviton both from the scattering of inflatons during the reheating era, and from the Standard Model bath via the UV freeze-in mechanism. By considering the DM to be a scalar

We introduce a set of generic conditions for the slow contracting Universe and for a narrowed-down category of models called fast-roll models. We present general conditions for superhorizon freeze-out of scalar and tensor perturbations and show that any fast-roll model satisfies them, as in the case of inflation. We are interested in the “Sourced Bounce” scenario, where perturbations are sourced by

We propose a new measure for eternal inflation, based on search optimization and first-passage statistics. This work builds on the dynamical selection mechanism for vacua based on search optimization proposed recently by the author and Parrikar. The approach is motivated by the possibility that eternal inflation has unfolded for a finite time much shorter than the exponentially long mixing time for

We study the impact of the viscous effects of the primordial plasma on the evolution of the primordial gravitational waves (pGW) spectrum from Inflation until today, considering a self-consistent interaction that incorporates the back-reaction of the GW into the plasma. We use a relativistic causal hydrodynamic framework with a positive entropy production based on a Second-Order Theory (SOT) in which

The Probe Of Extreme Multi-Messenger Astrophysics (POEMMA) is designed to accurately observe ultra-high-energy cosmic rays (UHECRs) and cosmic neutrinos from space with sensitivity over the full celestial sky. POEMMA will observe the air fluorescence produced by extensive air showers (EASs) from UHECRs and potentially UHE neutrinos above 20 EeV. Additionally, POEMMA has the ability to observe the Cherenkov

Within the framework of canonical type-I seesaw, a feebly interacting massive particle (FIMP) χ is introduced as a dark matter candidate. The leptogenesis mechanism and dark matter relic density share a common origin via decays of Majorana neutrinos N. Provided an additional species φ whose energy density red-shifts as ρφ ∝ a -(4+n), the Hubble expansion rate is larger than the standard scenario, i

In this paper, we use a complete model of classical primordial standard clocks as an example to develop a methodology of directly comparing numerical predictions from complicated multi-field feature models with the Planck data, including the Planck 2018 Plik unbinned likelihood and the statistically most powerful CamSpec 2020 likelihood for temperature and polarization data. As this two-field inflationary

We study rapid-turn trajectories in a class of two-field cosmological models, whose scalar manifold is the Poincar disk. Background solutions in multi-field inflation, with field-space trajectories exhibiting sharp turns, can seed primordial black hole (PBH) formation. We investigate a class of exact solutions with hidden symmetry and show that they exhibit the kind of transient rapid-turn period,

We propose a dark energy model based on the physics of critical phenomena which is consistent with both the Planck's CMB and the Riess et al.'s local Hubble measurements. In this model the dark energy density behaves like the order parameter of a generic system which undergoes a phase transition. This means the dark energy is an emergent phenomenon and we named it critically emergent dark energy model

Local Universe observations find a value of the Hubble constant H 0 that is larger than the value inferred from the Cosmic Microwave Background and other early Universe measurements, assuming known physics and the ΛCDM cosmological model. We show that additional radiation in active neutrinos produced just before Big Bang Nucleosynthesis by an unstable sterile neutrino with mass ms = O(10) MeV can alleviate

We investigate in detail the spectrum of gravitational waves induced by a peaked primordial curvature power spectrum generated in single-field inflationary models. We argue that the f NL parameter can be inferred by measuring the high frequency spectral tilt of the induced gravitational waves. We also show that the intrinsically non-Gaussian impact of f NL in ΩGW is to broaden its peak, although at

It is well known that the inflationary scenario often displays different sets of degeneracies in its predictions for CMB observables. These degeneracies usually arise either because multiple inflationary models predict similar values for the scalar spectral index n S and the tensor-to-scalar ratio r, or because within the same model, the values of {n S , r} are insensitive to some of the model parameters

In the next decades, ultra-high-energy neutrinos in the EeV energy range will be potentially detected by next-generation neutrino telescopes. Although their primary goals are to observe cosmogenic neutrinos and to gain insight into extreme astrophysical environments, they can also indirectly probe the nature of dark matter. In this paper, we study the projected sensitivity of up-coming neutrino radio

Current observations present unprecedented opportunities to probe the true nature of black holes, which must harbor new physics beyond General Relativity to provide singularity-free descriptions. To test paradigms for this new physics, it is necessary to bridge the gap all the way from theoretical developments of new-physics models to phenomenological developments such as simulated images of black

The disagreement between direct late-time measurements of the Hubble constant from the SH0ES collaboration, and early-universe measurements based on the ΛCDM model from the Planck collaboration might, at least in principle, be explained by new physics in the early universe. Recently, the application of the Effective Field Theory of Large-Scale Structure to the full shape of the power spectrum of the

We study a theory of minimally modified gravity called cuscuton/VCDM that propagates only two gravitational degrees of freedom. Despite being apparently different from general relativity (GR), it is in principle possible that this theory might be obtained via a field redefinition starting from the GR action. This would make the vacuum theory equivalent to GR and the theory would differ from GR only

We investigate a scenario where the dark matter of the Universe is made from very light hidden photons transforming under a Z 2-symmetry. In contrast to the usual situation, kinetic mixing is forbidden by the symmetry and the dark photon interacts with the Standard Model photon only via an axion-like particle acting as a “messenger”. Focusing on signatures involving the ordinary photon, our survey

Line intensity mapping (LIM) is a rapidly emerging technique for constraining cosmology and galaxy formation using multi-frequency, low angular resolution maps. Many LIM applications crucially rely on cross-correlations of two line intensity maps, or of intensity maps with galaxy surveys or galaxy/CMB lensing. We present a consistent halo model to predict all these cross-correlations and enable joint

Line intensity mapping (LIM) proposes to efficiently observe distant faint galaxies and map the matter density field at high redshift. Building upon the formalism in a companion paper, we first highlight the degeneracies between cosmology and astrophysics in LIM. We discuss what can be constrained from measurements of the mean intensity and redshift-space power spectra. With a sufficient spectral resolution

We simulate numerically the formation of spherically symmetric primordial black holes (PBHs) seeded by different families of primordial curvature perturbations profiles in a radiation dominated Friedman-Robertson-Walker (FRW) Universe. We have studied the dependency on the curvature profile of the initial mass M BH,i of the PBHs at the time of apparent horizon formation t AH, and the final mass M BH

Why are the cosmological constant, electroweak and Planck scales so different? This “double hierarchy” problem, where Λ ≪ M2 EW ≪ M2 p , is one of the most pressing in fundamental physics. We show that in a theory of N randomly coupled massive gravitons at the electroweak scale, these scales are linked precisely by such a double hierarchy for large N, with intriguing cosmological consequences. Surprisingly

Cosmological constraints of Modified Gravity (MG) models are seldom carried out rigorously. First, even though general MG models evolve differently (i.e., background and perturbations) to the standard cosmological model, it is usual to assume a ΛCDM background. This treatment is not correct and in the era of precision cosmology could induce undesired biases in cosmological parameters. Second, neutrino

We study neutrinos and dark matter based on a gauged U(1)R symmetry in the framework of a radiative seesaw scenario. We identify the dark matter as a bosonic particle that interacts with the quark and the lepton sectors through vector-like heavier quarks and leptons. The dark matter also plays a role in generating the neutrino mass matrix with the neutral heavier fermions. We explore several constraints

In the early universe, the potential of a scalar field can be significantly modified, and the scalar field may be trapped for a long time in a different location than the current vacuum. The trapping effect can increase or decrease the scalar abundance. For instance, in thermal inflation, a scalar field is trapped at the top of the potential by a thermal effect and dominates the universe to drive inflation

Intrinsic galaxy alignments yield an important contribution to the observed statistics of galaxy shapes. The general bias expansion for galaxy sizes and shapes in three dimensions has been recently described by Vlah, Chisari & Schmidt using the general perturbative effective field theory (EFT) framework, in analogy to the clustering of galaxies. In this work, we present a formalism that uses the properties

We study the effective field theory (including operators up to dimension five) of models in which dark matter is composite, consisting of either an electroweak doublet Dirac fermion (`higgsino-like dark matter') or an electroweak triplet Majorana fermion (`wino-like dark matter'). Some of the dimension-five operators in the former case cause mass splittings between the neutralino and chargino states

We develop an analytical forward model based on perturbation theory to predict the redshift-space galaxy overdensity at the field level given a realization of the initial conditions. We find that the residual noise between the model and simulated galaxy density has a power spectrum that is white on large scales, with size comparable to the shot noise. In the mildly nonlinear regime, we see a k2μ2 correction

A dark QCD sector is a relatively minimal extension of the Standard Model (SM) that admits Dark Matter (DM) candidates, but requires no portal to the visible sector beyond gravitational interactions: a “nightmare scenario” for DM detection. We consider a secluded dark sector containing a single flavor of light, vector-like dark quark gauged under (N). In the large-N limit, this single-flavor theory

We present , a general-purpose Bayesian analysis code aimed at models with complex internal interdependencies. Without the need for specific code by the user, interdependencies between different stages of a model pipeline are exploited for sampling efficiency: intermediate results are automatically cached, and parameters are grouped in blocks according to their dependencies and optimally sorted, taking

The scale of small-field inflation cannot be constrained via primordial gravitational waves through measurement of tensor-to-scalar ratio r. In this study, I show that if cosmic strings are produced after symmetry breaking at the end of hilltop supernatural inflation, this small-field inflation model can be tested through the production of gravitational waves from cosmic strings. Future experiments

The polarization of Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) photons is rotated as they pass through (ultralight-) axion string loops. Studying this birefringence can reveal valuable information about the axion-photon coupling and the structure of the string network. We develop an approximate analytic formalism and identify a kernel function that can be used to calculate the two-point correlation function

Experimental developments in neutrino telescopes are drastically improving their ability to constrain the annihilation cross-section of dark matter. In this paper, we employ an angular power spectrum analysis method to probe the galactic and extra-galactic dark matter signals. First we derive projections for a next generation of neutrino telescope that is inspired by KM3NeT. We emphasise that such

The Lyα forest provides one of the best means of mapping large-scale structure at high redshift, including our tightest constraint on the distance-redshift relation before cosmic noon. We describe how the large-scale correlations in the Lyα forest can be understood as an expansion in cumulants of the optical depth field, which itself can be related to the density field by a bias expansion. This provides

Standard methodologies for the extraction of the stochastic gravitational wave background (SGWB) from auto- or cross-correlation of interferometric signals often involve the use of a filter function. The standard optimal filter maximizes the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) between the total SGWB and the noise. We derive expressions for the optimal filter and SNR in the presence of a target SGWB plus other

Cascade of particles injected as Hawking Radiation from Primordial Black Holes (PBH) can potentially change the cosmic recombination history by ionizing and heating the intergalactic medium, which results in altering the anisotropy spectra of the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB). In this paper, we study the expected sensitivity of several future CMB experiments in constraining the abundance of PBHs

In this paper, we study the evolution of the ionization fraction x e(z) during the epoch of reionization by using the dispersion measurements (DMs) of fast radio bursts (FRBs). Different from the previous studies, here we turn to consider the large-scale clustering information of observed DMs of FRB catalog, which only needs the rough redshift distribution, instead of the exact redshift information

We investigate the gravitational waves (GWs) produced from the Peccei-Quinn (PQ) phase transition associated with the clockwork axion. The PQ phase transition can be first-order when the dimension-6 operator is included into the scalar potential. The GWs from the PQ phase transition at scale in the range of 103-106 GeV are detectable for the BBO and ALIA interferometers. The LISA and Taiji interferometers

We show that in the presence of disorder induced by random networks of observers measuring covariant quantities (such as scalar curvature) (3+1)-dimensional quantum gravity exhibits an effective dimensional reduction at large spatio-temporal scales, which is analogous to the Parisi-Sourlas phenomenon observed for quantum field theories in random external fields. After averaging over disorder associated

The characterization and modeling of polarized foregrounds has become a critical issue in the quest for primordial B-modes. A typical method to proceed is to factorize and parametrize the spectral properties of foregrounds and their scale dependence (i.e. assuming that foreground spectra are well described everywhere by their sky average). Since in reality foreground properties vary across the Galaxy

The extragalactic background light is comprised of the cumulative radiation from all galaxies across the history of the universe. The angular power spectrum of the anisotropies of such a background at near-infrared (IR) frequencies lacks of a complete understanding and shows a robust excess which cannot be easily explained with known sources. Dark matter in the form of axion-like particles (ALPs) with

Effective theory framework based on symmetry has recently gained widespread interest in the field of cosmology. In this paper, we apply the same idea on the genesis of the primordial magnetic field and its evolution throughout the cosmological universe. Given the broken time-diffeomorphism symmetry by the cosmological background, we considered the most general Lagrangian of electromagnetic and metric

We construct the catalogues of standard sirens (StS) based on the future gravitational wave (GW) detector networks, i.e., the second-generation ground-based advanced LIGO+advanced Virgo+KAGRA+LIGO-India (HLVKI), the third-generation ground-based Einstein Telescope+two Cosmic Explorer (ET+2CE), and the space-based LISA+Taiji. From the corresponding electromagnetic (EM) counterpart detectors for each

We present novel realizations of Higgs inflation within Supergravity which are largely tied to the existence of a pole of order two in the kinetic term of the inflaton field. This pole arises due to the selected s which parameterize the (SU(1,1)/U(1))2 or SU(2,1)/(SU(2) U(1)) manifolds with scalar curvatures ℛ(11)2 =-4/N or ℛ21=-3/N respectively. The associated superpotential includes, in addition

We study the photodisintegration process triggered by the nonthermal electromagnetic Hawking radiation from primordial black holes (PBHs) in critical collapse model. We consider the simplest case that all PBHs formed at a single epoch stemming from an inflationary spectrum with a narrow peak, and an extended mass distribution is obtained due to critical phenomena of gravitational collapse. The presence

We perform a detailed study of dark matter production via freeze-in under the assumption that some fluid dominates the early Universe before depositing its energy to the plasma causing entropy injection. As a dark matter candidate we consider a fermionic singlet that is produced through its interactions with a scalar particle in the thermal plasma. The fluid alters the expansion rate of the Universe

We study the effects of a beyond-Horndeski theory of modified gravity in the interior of a population II star. We consider a simple phenomenological model of a 1.1M ☉ star that has left the main sequence, has a thin Hydrogen burning shell with a partially degenerate isothermal core, surrounded by a radiative envelope having two regions of distinct opacities. Using suitable matching conditions at the

Mainly motivated by the recent GW190521 mass gap event which we take as a benchmark point, we critically assess if binaries made of a primordial black hole and a black hole of astrophysical origin may form, merge in stellar clusters and reproduce the LIGO/Virgo detection rate. While two previously studied mechanisms — the direct capture and the three body induced — seem to be inefficient, we propose

It is remarkable that the primordial fluctuations as revealed by the CMB coincide with what quantum fluctuations would look like if they were stretched across the sky by accelerated cosmic expansion. It has been observed that this same stretching also brings very small — even trans-Planckian — length scales up to observable sizes if extrapolated far enough into the past. This potentially jeopardizes

Cosmology is well suited to study the effects of long range interactions due to the large densities in the early Universe. In this article, we explore how the energy density and equation of state of a fermion system diverge from the commonly assumed ideal gas form under the presence of scalar long range interactions with a range much smaller than cosmological scales. In this scenario, “small”-scale

We study two key issues militating against the use of the anisotropic three-point correlation function (3PCF) for cosmological parameter inference: difficulties with its computational estimation and high-dimensionality. We show how high-dimensionality may be reduced significantly by multipole decompositions of all angular dependence. This allows deriving the full expression for the multipole moments

Long duration gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) are among the least understood astrophysical transients powering the high-energy universe. To date, various mechanisms have been proposed to explain the observed electromagnetic GRB emission. In this work, we show that, although different jet models may be equally successful in fitting the observed electromagnetic spectral energy distributions, the neutrino production

Interpreting observations of the Lyman-α forest flux power spectrum requires interpolation between a small number of expensive simulations. We present a Gaussian process emulator modelling the 1D flux power spectrum as a function of the amplitude and slope of the small-scale linear matter power spectrum, and the state of the intergalactic medium at the epoch of interest (2 < z < 4). This parameterisation

We quantify the calibration requirements for systematic uncertainties for next-generation ground-based observatories targeting the large-angle B-mode polarization of the Cosmic Microwave Background, with a focus on the Simons Observatory (SO). We explore uncertainties on gain calibration, bandpass center frequencies, and polarization angles, including the frequency variation of the latter across the

We show generalized Galileons — a particular subclass of Horndeski gravity — arise from a consistent Kaluza-Klein reduction of the low-energy effective action of heterotic string theory to first order in α'. This suggests Horndeski theories of gravity have a string-theoretic origin. The form of the Galileonic terms is precisely fixed by parameters of the embedding spacetime, so that only a specific

With the advent of a new generation of cosmological experiments that will provide high-precision measurements of the cosmic microwave background (CMB) and galaxies in the large-scale structure, it is pertinent to examine the potential of performing a joint analysis of multiple cosmological probes. In this paper, we study the cosmological information content contained in the one-loop power spectra and