ar X iv : a st ro - p h / 99 12 34 5 v 1 1 6 D ec 1 99 9 ‘ FIRST LIGHT ’ IN THE UNIVERSE ; WHAT ENDED THE “ DARK AGE ” ?

ar X iv : a st ro - p h / 99 11 29 4 v 1 1 6 N ov 1 99 9 What is the Universe made of ? How old is it ?

For the past 15 years most astronomers have assumed that 95% of the Universe was in some mysterious form of cold dark matter. They also assumed that the cosmological constant, ΩΛ, was Einstein’s biggest blunder and could be ignored. However, recent measurements of the cosmic microwave background combined with other cosmological observations strongly suggest that 75% of the Universe is made of c...

ar X iv : a st ro - p h / 99 12 27 7 v 1 1 4 D ec 1 99 9 Relations between the scales of length , time and mass

It is considered the model of the universe in which the scales of length, time and mass are related by the special relativity constant c, by the Newton gravity constant G and by the quantum mechanics constant ¯ h. The model meets constraints from the current age of the universe, from the high-redshift supernovae data, and from primordial nucleosynthesis. The model predicts the fractal structure...

ar X iv : a st ro - p h / 96 11 14 3 v 1 1 9 N ov 1 99 6 A high deuterium abundance in the early Universe

ar X iv : a st ro - p h / 99 12 32 6 v 1 1 5 D ec 1 99 9 Microquasars Jochen Greiner

Microquasars are binary systems in our Galaxy which sporadically eject matter at relativistic speeds along bipolar jets. While phenomenologically similar to quasars, their vicinity allows much more in-depth studies. I review the observational aspects of microquasars, in particular the new developments on the interplay between accretion disk instabilities and jet ejection.

ar X iv : a st ro - p h / 99 11 03 5 v 3 1 D ec 1 99 9 Top - Down Models and Extremely High Energy Cosmic Rays

We developed numerical code for calculation of the extragalactic component of the spectra of leptons, nucleons and γ-rays resulting from " top-down " (non-acceleration) models for the case of uniform and isotropic source distribution. We explored two different classes of " top-down " scenarios: the wide earlier investigated class of X particles coming from collapse and/or annihilation of cosmic...