Causal bulk viscous dissipative isotropic cosmologies with variable gravitational and cosmological constants

Abstract

We consider the evolution of a flat Friedmann-Robertson-Walker Universe, filled with a causal bulk viscous cosmological fluid, in the presence of variable gravitational and cosmological constants. The basic equation for the Hubble parameter, generalizing the evolution equation in the case of constant gravitational coupling and cosmological term is derived, under the supplementary assumption that the total energy of the Universe is conserved. By assuming that the cosmological constant is proportional to the square of the Hubble parameter and a power law dependence of the bulk viscosity coefficient, temperature and relaxation time on the energy density of the cosmological fluid, two classes of exact solutions of the field equations are obtained. In the first class of solutions the Universe ends in an inflationary era, while in the second class of solutions the expansion of the Universe is noninflationary for all times. In both models the cosmological "constant" is a decreasing function of time, while the gravitational "constant" increases in the early period of evolution of the Universe and tends in the large time limit to a constant value.