Tufts/CfA/MIT Cosmology Seminar, at Tufts:

Tuesday, January 30, 2001
2:30 pm
Robinson Hall, Room 250
Refreshments at 2:00 in Knipp Library, Room 251

"Trans-Planckian Problem for Inflationary Cosmology"


Robert Brandenberger
Brown University

Abstract:

In most scalar field-driven inflationary models, the period of inflation lasts so long that comoving scales of cosmological interest today have a physical wavelength smaller than the Planck length at the beginning of inflation. Hence, the theoretical foundations underlying the calculation of the spectrum of fluctuations breaks down. It is shown that the predictions of inflation depend on the assumptions made about physics on sub-Planck lengths.

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