Relaxation dominated cosmological expansion
  The behavior near the singularity of an isotropic, homogeneous cosmological model with a viscous fluid source is investigated. This turns out to be a relaxation dominated regime. Full extended irreversible thermodynamics is used, and comparison with results of the truncated theory is made. New singular behaviors are found and it is shown that a relaxation dominated inflationary epoch may exist for fluids with small heat capacity. 
Luis P. Chimento and Alejandro S. Jakubi