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Article Contents

ABSTRACT

1.OVERVIEW

2.A HOT BIG BANG REMINDER

2.1.Overview

2.2.Equations of motion

2.3.Standard cosmological solutions

2.4.Critical density and the density parameter

2.5.Characteristic scales and horizons

2.6.Redshift and temperature

2.7.The history of the Universe

3.THE INFLATIONARY COSMOLOGY

3.1.The definition of inflation

3.2.Scalar fields and their potentials

3.3.Models of inflation

3.4.Equations of motion and solutions

3.5.The relation between inflation and slow-roll

3.6.The amount of inflation

3.7.A worked example: polynomial chaotic inflation

3.7.1.Multi-field theories

3.8.Reheating after inflation

4.DENSITY PERTURBATIONS AND GRAVITATIONAL WAVES

4.1.Production during inflation

4.2.A worked example

4.3.Observational consequences

4.4.Testing the idea of inflation

4.4.1.Growing mode perturbations

4.4.2.Gaussianity and adiabaticity

4.4.3.Tensor and vector modes

4.4.4.Power-law spectra

5.ACCELERATION IN THE PRESENT UNIVERSE

5.1.Cosmological constant: exact or effective?

5.2.Scaling solutions and trackers

5.3.Challenges for quintessence

6.SUMMARY

REFERENCES