The Dark Energy Survey

We describe the Dark Energy Survey (DES), a proposed optical-near infrared survey of 5000 sq. deg of the South Galactic Cap to ~24th magnitude in SDSS griz, that would use a new 3 sq. deg CCD camera to be mounted on the Blanco 4-m telescope at Cerro Telolo Inter-American Observatory (CTIO). The survey data will allow us to measure the dark energy and dark matter densities and the dark energy equation of state through four independent methods: galaxy clusters, weak gravitational lensing tomography, galaxy angular clustering, and supernova distances. These methods are doubly complementary: they constrain different combinations of cosmological model parameters and are subject to different systematic errors. By deriving the four sets of measurements from the same data set with a common analysis framework, we will obtain important cross checks of the systematic errors and thereby make a substantial and robust advance in the precision of dark energy measurements.Comment: White Paper submitted to the Dark Energy Task Force, 42 page

Dark energy without dark energy

It is proposed that the current acceleration of the universe is not originated by the existence of a mysterious dark energy fluid nor by the action of extra terms in the gravity Lagrangian, but just from the sub-quantum potential associated with the CMB particles. The resulting cosmic scenario corresponds to a benigner phantom model which is free from the main problems of the current phantom approaches.Comment: 4 pages, 1 figure, to appear in AIP proceedings of "Dark side of the Universe

The Dark Energy Survey

We describe the Dark Energy Survey (DES), a proposed optical-near infrared survey of 5000 sq. deg of the South Galactic Cap to ~24th magnitude in SDSS griz, that would use a new 3 sq. deg CCD camera to be mounted on the Blanco 4-m telescope at Cerro Telolo Inter-American Observatory (CTIO). The survey data will allow us to measure the dark energy and dark matter densities and the dark energy equation of state through four independent methods: galaxy clusters, weak gravitational lensing tomography, galaxy angular clustering, and supernova distances. These methods are doubly complementary: they constrain different combinations of cosmological model parameters and are subject to different systematic errors. By deriving the four sets of measurements from the same data set with a common analysis framework, we will obtain important cross checks of the systematic errors and thereby make a substantial and robust advance in the precision of dark energy measurements

Quantum Informational Dark Energy: Dark energy from forgetting

We suggest that dark energy has a quantum informational origin. Landauer's principle associated with the erasure of quantum information at a cosmic horizon implies the non-zero vacuum energy having effective negative pressure. Assuming the holographic principle, the minimum free energy condition, and the Gibbons-Hawking temperature for the cosmic event horizon we obtain the holographic dark energy with the parameter $d\simeq 1$, which is consistent with the current observational data. It is also shown that both the entanglement energy and the horizon energy can be related to Landauer's principle.Comment: revtex,8 pages, 2 figures more detailed arguments adde

Dark Energy and Dark Matter

It is a puzzle why the densities of dark matter and dark energy are nearly equal today when they scale so differently during the expansion of the universe. This conundrum may be solved if there is a coupling between the two dark sectors. In this paper we assume that dark matter is made of cold relics with masses depending exponentially on the scalar field associated to dark energy. Since the dynamics of the system is dominated by an attractor solution, the dark matter particle mass is forced to change with time as to ensure that the ratio between the energy densities of dark matter and dark energy become a constant at late times and one readily realizes that the present-day dark matter abundance is not very sensitive to its value when dark matter particles decouple from the thermal bath. We show that the dependence of the present abundance of cold dark matter on the parameters of the model differs drastically from the familiar results where no connection between dark energy and dark matter is present. In particular, we analyze the case in which the cold dark matter particle is the lightest supersymmetric particle.Comment: 4 pages latex, 2 figure

Dark Matter and Dark Energy due to Photons that Attract or Repel Each Other

The Through a simple model we study the possibility of photon with mass and charge that can produce an attractive or repulsive force at galactic distances. The main source of the dark energy can be provided by the non-vanishing photon mass during the period of dark radiation of the Universe. A simple analysis shows that the non-vanishing photon mass of the order of is consistent with the current observations. For distances separating nearby galaxies dominates the force of Newtonian attraction between photonic masses (Dark Matter). For distant galaxies dominates the repulsive electrical force between photon charges (Dark Energy)

Dark Energy and Dark Matter

A brief overview of our current understanding of abundance and properties of dark energy and dark matter is presented. A more focused discussion of supersymmetric dark matter follows. Included is a frequentist approach to the supersymmetric parameter space and consequences for the direct detection of dark matter.Comment: 12 pages, 8 figures, Summary of talk given at the XXIV International Symposium on Lepton Photon Interactions at High Energies, Hamburg Germany, August 200