The Dark Universe

An effective field theory framework where the early universe is dominated by a scalar field whose flat potential drives quasi-exponential expansion, generating the perturbation spectrum measured by Planck.

A 5D warped Anti-de-Sitter bulk solves the hierarchy problem via exponential warping.

A dark energy carried by a scalar field whose potential dips below zero can halt and reverse the expansion, sending even a flat universe into a Big Crunch within a calculable time.

A constant equation of state below -1 drives the dark energy density to infinity in a finite time, unbinding clusters, galaxies, stars, planets, and finally atoms in a fixed sequence ending at a cosmic doomsday.

A four-dimensional star collapsed in a five-dimensional bulk, throwing off a three-dimensional membrane that became our expanding universe.

If the early universe produced light enough black holes, Hawking radiation would have evaporated them by now or be evaporating them today. Heavier primordial black holes could be some or all of dark matter. Fifty years of searches and no confirmed detection.

Two empirical handles, one underlying physics. Lorentz-invariant 'swerves' in particle trajectories test discreteness via gamma-ray-burst and neutrino observations. Sorkin's 1991 quasi-prediction that Λ should be of order 10^-120 in Planck units matched the 1998 dark-energy discovery to order of magnitude.

Gravity is an entropic force from information on holographic screens. The 2016 dark-matter extension has been substantially constrained by weak-lensing tests.