Gravitational waves as a probe of the early Universe

by Prof. Jun'ichi Yokoyama (Research Center for the Early Universe, University of Tokyo)

Thursday 28 Jan 2010, 16:00 → 17:15 Europe/Brussels

E.349

Stochastic gravitational wave background generated in the early Universe provide useful information on the early Universe. If cosmological GW background produced during inflation is detected around a frequency 1Hz, we can probe the reheating temperature after inflation. On the other hand, gravitational waves produced from second-order scalar perturbations can be used as a probe of the abundance of primordial black holes. Pulsar timing already rules out the intermediate-mass black holes to be of primordial origin, while DECIGO can show if PBHs can be dark matter.