- The observational context: Cosmic
Microwave Background Radiation, Hubble expansion,
galaxies, dark matter, clustering properties of
galaxies, large-scale structure, peculiar
velocities, deviations from isotropic Hubble
flow, light element abundances
- The theory of gravitation: Difficulties
with Newtonian gravitation, Mach's Principle,
isotropic curved spaces, special relativity,
4-vectors, covariant formulation of
electrodynamics, outline of general relativity,
Einstein field equations.
- The "standard" cosmological
models: Cosmological principles,
Robertson-Walker metric, measurements of
distances, luminosities, angular sizes,
Friedman models, anthropic principle and
Dirac's large numbers
- Thermal history of the Universe:
Radiation-dominated expansion, recombination,
fluctuations
- Big-Bang Nucleosynthesis: Nuclear
statistical equilibrium in the early Universe,
light element synthesis, baryon and lepton
asymmetry
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- Inflationary cosmology: Expansion,
flatness, horizon, equation of state,
fluctuation spectrum
- Galaxy formation: Jeans' instability,
growth of density perturbations,, dissipation
processes, fluctuations in baryonic and
non-baryonic matter, hot and cold dark matter
models, measured clustering spectra,
peculiar velocity fields
- CMB Fluctuations: gravitational,
adiabatic, and Doppler perturbations, multipole
expansion, angular structure, re-heating,
Sunyaev-Zeldovich Effect, anisotropies
- Evolution of galaxies:Non-linear collapse
of density perturbations, hierarchical clustering,
source counts, background radiation
- Evolution of star formation rates and element
abundances: Lyman-alpha clouds,
star-forming galaxies out to large redshifts,
cosmic chemical evolution
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