Late time acceleration in Brans-Dicke cosmology - art. no. 124006

In this work we investigate the possibility of having a late time accelerat ed phase of the universe, suggested by recent supernova observation, in the context of Brans-Dicke theory with a potential having a time dependent mas s squared term which has recently become negative and a matter field. We fi nd that while a perfect fluid (pressureless and with pressure) cannot suppo rt this acceleration, a fluid with dissipative pressure can drive this late time acceleration for a simple power-law expansion of the universe. We hav e also calculated some cosmological parameters in our model to match with o bservations.