Quantum Field Theory and Cosmology

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The PI will study a class of quantum effects which take place during the phase of accelerated expansion known as "primordial inflation." These effects do many fascinating things such as changing the masses and field strengths of fundamental particles, and changing the rate at which the universe expands. An important property of these effects is that they grow with time until conventional approximation techniques break down. The PI will complete the development of a new technique with which this class of quantum effects can be evolved to arbitrarily late times. The work will involve reciprocal visits to collaborate with Professor Nikolaos Tsamis (University of Crete, Greece) and Professor Tomislav Prokopec (University of Utrecht, The Netherlands). Important projects will also involve the PI's graduate students: Miss Shun-Pei Miao and Mr.Emre Kahya.Some of these effects may give rise to currently observable consequences such as distortions in the spectrum of primordial perturbations, anomalously large populations of very long wavelength particles, and modifications of the gravitational force law. It seems entirely possible that certain of these effects are even dominating the current large scale evolution of the universe. In addition to deciding these issues, this project will lead to solid advances in quantum field theory on an expanding universe.