Dark matter relic density and Early Universe properties

by Alexandre Arbey (Universite Claude Bernard-Lyon I)

Friday 12 Nov 2010, 11:30 → 12:30 Europe/Zurich

Geneva University

The nature of dark matter is one of the most important questions of cosmology. Many particle physics scenarios beyond the Standard Model (BSM) propose candidates for dark matter, and the relic density of dark matter can be computed and compared to the cosmological observations. This technique is generally used to constrain new physics parameters. During this seminar, I will first present the standard cosmological model, the cosmological observations and the problems of the cosmological model. I will describe different mechanisms that could have occurred before BBN, and explain their consequences on the relic density calculation. Considering the relic density calculation in the minimal supersymmetric extension of the SM (MSSM), I will show that the Early Universe deviations from the standard cosmological model can have extremely large consequences on the calculated relic density. I will finally present methods to constrain the Early Universe properties using collider data.