Cosmology and Astroparticles

Abstract

Talks given at the V Taller de Particulas y Campos (V-TPyC) and V Taller Latinoam. de Fenomenologia de las Interac. Fundam. (V-TLFIF), Puebla, Mexico, 10/30 - 11/3 1995. These lectures are devoted to elementary particle physicists and assume the reader has very little or no knowledge of cosmology and astrophysics. After a brief historical introduction to the development of modern cosmology and astro-particles in which the Hot Big Bang model is defined, the Robertson-Walker metric and the dynamics of the Friedmann-Robertson-Walker cosmology are discussed in section 2. In section 3 the main observational features of the Universe are reviewed, including a description of our neighbourhood, homogeneity and isotropy, the cosmic background radiation, the expansion, the age and the matter content of the Universe. A brief account of the thermal history of the Universe follows in section 4, and relic abundances are discussed in section 5. Section 6 is devoted to primordial nucleosynthesis, section 7 to structure formation in the Universe and section 8 to the possibility of detection of the dark matter in the halo of our galaxy.