Van der Waals quintessence

We discuss the cosmology derived by taking into account the Van der Waals equation in order to describe the thermodynamic state of the universe. The approach is more realistic with respect to the usual one where the perfect fluid equation of state is taken into account. The universe can be described as a two-phase fluid where a component can be seen as a sort of large scale structure fluid and another one as a background fluid. Another main result is that we recover an asymptotic critical state which acts as a cosmological constant. In this sense, we recover a sort of quintessential picture where the cosmic fluid undergoes an accelerated behaviour. (C) 2002 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.