BNL Physics Colloquia

The connected universe: Relating Early, Intermediate and Late Universe with cosmological data, Leona Woods Distinguished Postdoctoral Lectureship Award colloquium, Vivian Miranda (U.Arizona)

US/Eastern
Description

The standard paradigm of cosmology is built upon on a series of 

propositions about how the early, intermediate and late epochs of the 

universe behave. In particular, it predicts that the universe is 

currently filled with dark energy and dark matter. Understanding the 

properties of dark energy is plausibly the biggest challenge in 

theoretical physics; while we believe the general features of dark 

matter are well known. Indeed, there is a broad assumption in cosmology 

that the universe on its earlier stages is fully understood and that 

discrepancies between the standard model of cosmology and current data 

are suggestive of distinct dark energy properties. Uncertainties on the 

validity of this hypothesis are not usually taken into account when 

forecasting survey capabilities, even though our investigations might be 

obfuscated if the intermediate and early universe did behave abnormally. 

In this colloquium, I propose a program to investigate dark energy and 

earlier aspects of our universe simultaneously, through space missions 

in the 2020s in combination with ground-based observatories. This 

program will help guide the strategy for the future WFIRST supernovae 

and weak lensing surveys. My investigations on how properties of the 

early and intermediate universe affect inferences on dark energy (and 

vice-versa) will also support NASA's understanding of how future space 

missions can be used to test some of the core hypotheses of the standard 

model of cosmology.