Welcome

Primordial black hole apparent horizon from simulation

This is the webpage of the Cosmology and Computing group at Kenyon College. We use numerical simulations and analytical methods to understand the most extreme processes in the early Universe: the explosive period of particle production after inflation known as preheating, the formation of primordial black holes, and the generation of gravitational waves. Our work connects the fundamental physics of the early Universe to observations we can make today.

 

Recent Highlights

Primordial Black Holes from Kinetic Preheating (2025) — We showed that violent preheating after inflation can produce black holes in the early Universe, offering a new formation channel for primordial black hole dark matter. The image above shows the apparent horizon (black circle) forming in one of our simulations.

 

Gauge Preheating with Full General Relativity (2024) — The first fully general-relativistic simulations of gauge field preheating, revealing new dynamics invisible to linearized treatments.

 

Gravitational Waves from Kinetic Preheating (2024) — We computed the gravitational wave spectrum produced during kinetic preheating, connecting early Universe physics to signals detectable by future observatories.

People

Cam Benedix - Cam is a junior physics and math double major from Greencastle, Indiana. He is studying the effects of nonlinear gravity and relativistic fluid dynamics on cosmological first-order phase transitions.

Vivien (Viv) Luce - Viv is a junior physics major from Cleveland, Ohio. She is currently using a model of GABE with Newtonian gravity and gauge fields to test the viability of gauge preheating with the presence of charged particles.

Max Swanson - Max is a sophomore physics major from Valparaiso, Indiana. He is studying a hypothetical particle and potential dark matter candidate, the axion.

Jack Thatcher - Jack is a sophomore physics major from Boulder, Colorado. He is working on a project exploring the dynamics of axion and modulus fields that share a non-minimal gravitational coupling.

John T. Giblin, Jr (Tom) - Tom has been at Kenyon Since 2009 and is currently a Professor of Physics. Tom is interested in how numerical methods can help us learn about fundamental physics. His interests are in Cosmology, Particle Physics and Computation.

Alumni and Collaborators

Computers

Ann - Ann joined the group in May, 2014. She has 32 processors and 128 GB of RAM; but she's a CUDAmonster with a brand new Tessla K40 with 2880 Cores!

Eliza - Eliza just joined our group in June 2015. She is a monster with 256 GB of ram and twenty 3 GHz cores.

Jo - Jo has been with the cosmology group since 2009. Although she only has eight 3 Ghz processors, she makes up for it with 196 GB of RAM and 2 TB of 15,000 RPM storage.

Gabrielle - Gabrielle is the largest single-node-computer in central Ohio. Her primary allegiance is to the deparment of physics, but she enjoys Cosmological simulations. With 512 GB of RAM and 64 processors (that's right, 512 GB of shared memory) she can do almost anything.

Holly - Holly joined the cosmology group in 2012, replacing Holly Emeritus--the founding member. She is a MacPro with 64 GB of RAM and 8 real (16 virtual) processors. She is unparalled in her ability to run code, render phots and play '80's hair band music at the same time.

Sabrina - Sabrina is the administrative head of the Cosmological Simulators. She is a MacPro with 12 real-2.66 Ghz cores and 64 GB of RAM. She does what she wants.