Scaling Limits of Coalescent Processes Near Time Zero

Abstract: In this paper we obtain scaling limits of $\Lambda$-coalescents near time zero under a regularly varying assumption. In particular this covers the case of Kingman's coalescent and beta coalescents. The limiting processes are coalescents with infinite mass, obtained geometrically as tangent cones of Evans metric space associated with the coalescent. In the case of Kingman's coalescent we are able to obtain a simple construction of the limiting space using a two-sided Brownian motion.