Overview
Welcome! This is the page of the Particle Cosmology Münster research group at the Institute for Theoretical Physics. The research group was established in May 2022 and is headed by Kai Schmitz, a newly appointed junior professor in the Physics Department at the University of Münster. The group deals with research topics at the interface of particle physics and cosmology, notably gravitational waves from the early Universe, and is involved in the activities of the NANOGrav Pulsar Timing Array Collaboration. On this page, you will find more information on the following topics ...
Contact
Members
Current group members and guests more
Kai Schmitz | Group leader |
Oleksandr Sobol | Postdoc (Philipp Schwartz fellow) |
Richard von Eckardstein | PhD student |
Tobias Schröder | PhD student |
David Esmyol | MSc student |
Jonah Fabian | BSc student |
Peer Kuhlbrodt | BSc student |
Msab Zamout | BSc student |
Former group members and guests
Finn Kohl | Guest (PhD student in the Wulkenhaar research group at the University of Münster) | 04/2023–05/2023 |
Adeela Afzal | Guest (PhD student at Quaid-i-Azam University in Islamabad, Pakistan) | 11/2022–05/2023 |
Peter Stratmann | Guest (PhD student in the Andronic / Klein-Bösing research group at the University of Münster) | 11/2022–12/2022 |
Rafael R. Lino dos Santos | Guest (PhD student at Syddansk Universitet in Odense, Denmark) | 08/2022–02/2023 |
Research
New physics at the PTA frontier more
Topics: Exotic sources in the nHz band
Primordial gravitational waves more
Topics: Cosmic strings, cosmological phase transitions
Axion cosmology more
Topics: Dark matter, magnetic fields, black holes, hierarchy problem
Early Universe more
Topics: Inflation, reheating, baryogenesis, leptogenesis
Teaching
Courses
- Winter 23/24
[114658] Quantum field theory (course)
[114659] Quantum field theory (tutorial) - Sommer 23
[112525] General relativity (course)
[112545] General relativity (tutorial) - Winter 22/23
[110636] Gravitational waves (course)
[110637] Gravitational waves (tutorial) - Summer 22
[118669] Standard model (course)
[118670] Standard model (tutorial)
Seminars
Publications
Names of group members are printed in boldface.
2023
- [MS-TP-23-38] Richard von Eckardstein, Marco Peloso, Kai Schmitz, Oleksandr Sobol, Lorenzo Sorbo
Axion inflation in the strong-backreaction regime: decay of the Anber-Sorbo solution
arXiv:2309.04254 - [MS-TP-23-37] Wilfried Buchmüller, Valerie Domcke, Kai Schmitz
Metastable cosmic strings
arXiv:2307.04691 - [MS-TP-23-36] Richard von Eckardstein, Andrea Mitridate, Jonathan Nay, Ken Olum, Kai Schmitz, Tobias Schröder, Tanner Trickle, David Wright
PTArcade
arXiv:2306.16377 - [MS-TP-23-27] Astrid Eichhorn, Rafael R. Lino dos Santos, João Lucas Miqueleto
From quantum gravity to gravitational waves through cosmic strings
arXiv:2306.17718 - [MS-TP-23-13] Axel Brandenburg, Kohei Kamada, Kyohei Mukaida, Kai Schmitz, Jennifer Schober
Chiral magnetohydrodynamics with zero total chirality
arXiv:2304.06612 - [MS-TP-23-12] Gilles Weymann-Despres, Sophie Henrot-Versillé, Gilbert Moultaka, Vincent Vennin, Laurent Duflot, Richard von Eckardstein
MSSM-inflation revisited: Towards a coherent description of high-energy physics and cosmology
arXiv:2304.04534 - [MS-TP-23-06] Ruth Durrer, Oleksandr Sobol, Stanislav Vilchinskii
Backreaction from gauge fields produced during inflation
arXiv:2303.04583
2022
- [MS-TP-22-57] Rafael R. Lino dos Santos, Linda van Manen
Gravitational waves from the early universe
arXiv:2212.05594 - [MS-TP-22-37] Valerie Domcke, Kohei Kamada, Kyohei Mukaida, Kai Schmitz, Masaki Yamada
Wash-in leptogenesis after axion inflation
arXiv:2210.06412 - [MS-TP-22-23] Valerie Domcke, Kohei Kamada, Kyohei Mukaida, Kai Schmitz, Masaki Yamada
A new constraint on primordial lepton flavour asymmetries
arXiv:2208.03237 - [MS-TP-22-22] Martin Enriquez-Rojo, Tobias Schröder
Asymptotic symmetries and memories of gauge theories in FLRW spacetimes
arXiv:2207.13726 - [MS-TP-22-19] Pierre Auclair, Simone Blasi, Vedran Brdar, Kai Schmitz
Gravitational waves from current-carrying cosmic strings
arXiv:2207.03510 YouTube video abstract - [MS-TP-22-17] Alexandros Papageorgiou, Pablo Quílez, Kai Schmitz
Axion dark matter from frictional misalignment
arXiv:2206.01129 YouTube video abstract