Cosmic Bubble Collisions

Abstract

I briefly review the physics of cosmic bubble collisions in false-vacuum eternal inflation. My purpose is to provide an introduction to the subject for readers unfamiliar with it, focussing on recent work related to the prospects for observing the effects of bubble collisions in cosmology. I will attempt to explain the essential physical points as simply and concisely as possible, leaving most technical details to the references. I make no attempt to be comprehensive or complete. I also present a new solution to Einstein's equations that represents a bubble universe after a collision, containing vacuum energy and ingoing null radiation with an arbitrary density profile.