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Big Bang Nucleosynthesis: 2015

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Big-bang nucleosynthesis (BBN) describes the production of the lightest nuclides via a dynamic interplay among the four fundamental forces during the first seconds of cosmic time. We briefly overview the essentials of this physics, and present new calculations of light element abundances through li6 and li7, with updated nuclear reactions and uncertainties including those in the neutron lifetime. We provide fits to these results as a function of baryon density and of the number of neutrino flavors, N_nu. We review recent developments in BBN, particularly new, precision Planck cosmic microwave background (CMB) measurements that now probe the baryon density, helium content, and the effective number of degrees of freedom, n_eff. These measurements allow for a tight test of BBN and of cosmology using CMB data alone. Our likelihood analysis convolves the 2015 Planck data chains with our BBN output and observational data. Adding astronomical measurements of light elements strengthens the power of BBN. We include a new determination of the primordial helium abundance in our likelihood analysis. New D/H observations are now more precise than the corresponding theoretical predictions, and are consistent with the Standard Model and the Planck baryon density. Moreover, D/H now provides a tight measurement of N_nu when combined with the CMB baryon density, and provides a 2sigma upper limit N_nu < 3.2. The new precision of the CMB and of D/H observations together leave D/H predictions as the largest source of uncertainties. Future improvement in BBN calculations will therefore rely on improved nuclear cross section data. In contrast with D/H and he4, li7 predictions continue to disagree with observations, perhaps pointing to new physics.

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representative citing papers

Leptogenesis and Low Reheating Temperatures

hep-ph · 2026-07-09 · conditional · novelty 7.0

Standard non-thermal leptogenesis works at arbitrarily low reheating temperatures above the BBN bound when the inflaton potential has a quartic minimum (k≥4), because the inflaton's evolving mass kinematically shuts off RHN production early.

Fifty years of primordial helium abundances: A statistical reanalysis

astro-ph.CO · 2026-06-02 · unverdicted · novelty 5.0

A statistical reanalysis of 143 Y_p determinations from 1960s-2022 reveals long-term convergence with change points in the mid-2000s and early 2010s, plus significant non-independence among many extragalactic H II region measurements.

Gravitational Waves from Matter Perturbations of Spectator Scalar Fields

hep-ph · 2026-04-06 · unverdicted · novelty 5.0

A spectator scalar field with strong portal coupling to the inflaton sources a stochastic gravitational wave background reaching Ω_GW h² ∼ 10^{-11} at frequencies 10^7-10^8 Hz for benchmark parameters σ/λ ≃ 10^4 and T_reh = 2×10^{14} GeV.

Detectability of deuterium in spectra of early-type stars

astro-ph.SR · 2026-06-16 · unverdicted · novelty 4.0

Synthetic spectra and MCMC analysis establish deuterium detection limits in early-type stars as a function of SNR, Teff, and v sin i, with upper limits D/H < -5.5 dex for HD 32115 and < -4.9 dex for 21 Peg.

Noncanonical Approaches To Inflation

gr-qc · 2019-06-21 · unverdicted · novelty 3.0

A review thesis covering Mukhanov parametrization, general scalar-tensor theories, and new slow-roll techniques for canonical and noncanonical inflation observables.

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