  A rapid phase of accelerated expansion in the early universe, known as
inflation, dilutes all matter except the vacuum induced quantum fluctuations.
These are responsible for seeding the initial perturbations in the baryonic
matter, the non-baryonic dark matter and the observed temperature anisotropy in
the cosmic microwave background (CMB) radiation. To explain the universe
observed today, the end of inflation must also excite a thermal bath filled
with baryons, an amount of baryon asymmetry, and dark matter. We review the
current understanding of inflation, dark matter, mechanisms for generating
matter-anti-matter asymmetry, and the prospects for testing them at ground and
space based experiments.
