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Primordial nucleosynthesis: A cosmological probe

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 April 2010

Gary Steigman
Gary Steigman*
Affiliation:
Departments of Physics and Astronomy, Center for Cosmology and Astro-Particle Physics, The Ohio State University, 192 West Woodruff Avenue, Columbus, OH 43210USA email: steigman@mps.ohio-state.edu
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Abstract

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During its early evolution the Universe provided a laboratory to probe fundamental physics at high energies. Relics from those early epochs, such as the light elements synthesized during primordial nucleosynthesis when the Universe was only a few minutes old, and the cosmic background photons, last scattered when the protons (and alphas) and electrons (re)combined some 400 thousand years later, may be used to probe the standard models of cosmology and of particle physics. The internal consistency of primordial nucleosynthesis is tested by comparing the predicted and observed abundances of the light elements, and the consistency of the standard models is explored by comparing the values of the cosmological parameters inferred from primordial nucleosynthesis with those determined by studying the cosmic background radiation.

Keywords

cosmology: early universenucleosynthesiscosmological parameters
Type
Contributed Papers
Information
Proceedings of the International Astronomical Union , Volume 5 , Symposium S268: Light Elements in the Universe , November 2009 , pp. 19 - 26
Copyright
Copyright © International Astronomical Union 2010

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