Power law inflation (Q1048047)

The spacetimes currently used by astrophysicists to model the universe are ones with accelerated expansion. Such an expansion can be achieved by many different mechanisms. Due to this uncertainty, it seems reasonable to try to understand the behavior of solutions under as general assumptions on the model as possible. One particular question is that of future global non-linear stability. The subject of this paper is Einstein's equations coupled to a non-linear scalar field with an exponential potential. The authors prove a result stating that if initial data are available that are close enough to those of such a solution on a ball of a certain radius, then all causal geodesics are complete to the future in the maximal globally hyperbolic development of the data started with. A quite general stability statement in the spatially locally homogeneous setting is obtained.