Forensic Cosmology: Probing Baryons and Neutrinos With BBN and the CBR

Abstract

The primordial abundances of the light nuclides produced by Big Bang Nucleosynthesis (BBN) during the first 20 minutes in the evolution of the Universe are sensitive to the universal density of baryons and to the expansion rate of the early Universe. For example, while deuterium is an excellent baryometer, helium-4 provides an accurate chronometer. Some 400 kyr later, when the cosmic background radiation (CBR) was freed from the grasp of the ionized plasma of protons and electrons, the spectrum of temperature fluctuations also depended on (among other parameters) the baryon density and the density in relativistic particles. The comparison between the constraints imposed by BBN and those from the CBR reveals a remarkably consistent picture of the Universe at two widely separated epochs in its evolution. Combining these two probes leads to new estimates of the baryon density at present and tighter constraints on possible physics beyond the standard model of particle physics. In this review the consistency between these complementary probes of the universal baryon density and the early-Universe expansion rate is exploited to provide new constraints on any asymmetry between relic neutrinos and anti-neutrinos (neutrino degeneracy).