Exact Scalar Field Cosmology with Causal Viscous Fluid

An exact cosmological solution for Friedman Robertson Walker (FRW)metric is obtained with a classical scalar field φ along with a potential in the presence of a causal viscous fluid. Assuming the scale factor to be a function of the scalar field we have obtained solutions in both the truncated and the full causal theory. It is shown that an inflationary model can be obtained by imposing certain constraints on some constants. The radiative bulk viscosity during the decoupling era has also been studied as a special case. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.