Connecting Fundamental Physics and Cosmology

Syracuse University, Syracuse NY

Investigators

Abstract

Rapid advances in observational cosmology have revealed a universe that provides for some of our most speculative ideas about the early cosmos, while raising entirely new questions about its late-time evolution. Precision measurements of the Cosmic Microwave Background radiation (CMB) and type I a supernovae light curves demonstrate the universe to be spatially flat with the majority of its matter being dark and the majority of it energy dark energy with a strongly negative pressure, resulting in an accelerating universe today. A major component of this proposal concerns the embryonic idea that cosmic acceleration may signal new gravitational physics. The PI and collaborators have proposed a new modification to the Einstein-Hilbert action that results in late time cosmic acceleration without dark energy. Carrying out the exploration of a wider class of gravitational origins for cosmic acceleration is a major research avenue of the current proposal.