In today's episode, we are thrilled to welcome Molly Burkmar (Ph.D. student at the University of Portsmouth), a researcher in cosmology. Molly Burkmar takes us on an in-depth exploration into the dynamics of Friedmann-Lemaître-Robertson-Walker (FLRW) cosmologies consisting of dark matter, radiation, and dark energy with a quadratic equation of state.

Molly Burkmar focuses her analysis on non-singular bouncing and cyclic cosmologies, casting a spotlight on the potential for closed models to always have a bounce under any initial conditions. With a careful examination of the range of dynamical behaviors admitted by the system, she identifies a unique class of closed models that admit a non-singular bounce, characterized by early- and late-time accelerated expansion connected by a decelerating phase.

Our conversation delves into the cond ...