Table of Contents

* Editors Foreword * The Universe Observed * Robertson-Walker Metric * Standard Cosmology * Big-Bang Nucleosynthesis * Thermodynamics in the Expanding Universe * Baryogenesis * Phase Transitions * Inflation * Structure Formation * Axions * Toward the Planck Epoch * Finale

About the Author

Edward W. Kolb is head of the NASA/Fermilab Astrophysics centre at the Fermi National Accelerator labouratory, and is a professor of astronomy and astrophysics in the Enrico Fermi Institute at the University of Chicago, where his teaching was recognized by the Quantrell Prize for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching in 1993. Dr. Kolb was a J. Robert Oppenheimer Research Fellow at Los Alamos National labouratory, and a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the California Institute of Technology. Kolb's research involves the study of the early Universe in the first seconds after the "Big Bang" when the energies and densities of particles in the universe were similar to conditions produced in the high-energy collisions of particles at accelerator. Kolb gives popular accounts of the Big Bang as a Harlow Shapley Visiting Lecturer under the sponsorship of the American Astronomical Society, and as a lecturer at Chicago's Adler Plantetarium.Michael S. Turner is a professor of physics and of Astronomy and Astrophysics in the Enrico Fermi Institute at the University of Chicago, and is deputy head of the NASA/Fermilab Astrophysics centre. Dr. Turner received his B.S. from the California Institute of Technology, his Ph.D. from Stanford University, and was an Enrico Fermi Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Chicago. In 1983, he was awarded the Quantrell Prize for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching. His other distinctions include an Alfred P. Sloan Fellowship and the Helen B. Warner Prize. Dr. Turner's research focuses on the confluence of astrophysics, cosmology, and particle physics, particularly the earliest history of the Universe. Edward W. Kolb is head of the NASA/Fermilab Astrophysics centre at the Fermi National Accelerator labouratory, and is a professor of astronomy and astrophysics in the Enrico Fermi Institute at the University of Chicago, where his teaching was recognized by the Quantrell Prize for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching in 1993. Dr. Kolb was a J. Robert Oppenheimer Research Fellow at Los Alamos National labouratory, and a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the California Institute of Technology. Kolb's research involves the study of the early Universe in the first seconds after the "Big Bang" when the energies and densities of particles in the universe were similar to conditions produced in the high-energy collisions of particles at accelerator. Kolb gives popular accounts of the Big Bang as a Harlow Shapley Visiting Lecturer under the sponsorship of the American Astronomical Society, and as a lecturer at Chicago's Adler Plantetarium.Michael S. Turner is a professor of physics and of Astronomy and Astrophysics in the Enrico Fermi Institute at the University of Chicago, and is deputy head of the NASA/Fermilab Astrophysics centre. Dr. Turner received his B.S. from the California Institute of Technology, his Ph.D. from Stanford University, and was an Enrico Fermi Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Chicago. In 1983, he was awarded the Quantrell Prize for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching. His other distinctions include an Alfred P. Sloan Fellowship and the Helen B. Warner Prize. Dr. Turner's research focuses on the confluence of astrophysics, cosmology, and particle physics, particularly the earliest history of the Universe.