Inflation and Precision Cosmology
Abstract
Description
A brief review of inflation is presented. After having demonstrated the generality of the inflationary mechanism, the emphasize is put on its simplest realization, namely the single field slow-roll inflationary scenario. Then, it is shown how, concretely, one can calculate the predictions of a given model of inflation. Finally, a short overview of the most popular models is given and the implications of the recently released WMAP data are briefly (and partially) discussed.
15 pages, 5 figures, plenary talk given at the XXIV Brazilian National Meeting on Particles and Fields (Caxambu, Brazil, 30 Sep - 4 Oct 2003)
15 pages, 5 figures, plenary talk given at the XXIV Brazilian National Meeting on Particles and Fields (Caxambu, Brazil, 30 Sep - 4 Oct 2003)