English

Consistency condition for inflation from (broken) conformal symmetry

High Energy Physics - Theory 2013-03-29 v2 Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics

Abstract

We investigate the symmetry constraints on the bispectrum, i.e. the three-point correlation function of primordial density fluctuations, in slow-roll inflation. It follows from the defining property of slow-roll inflation that primordial correlation functions inherit most of their structure from weakly broken de Sitter symmetries. Using holographic techniques borrowed from the AdS/CFT correspondence, the symmetry constraints on the bispectrum can be mapped to a set of stress-tensor Ward identities in a weakly broken 2+1-dimensional Euclidean CFT. We construct the consistency condition from these Ward identities using conformal perturbation theory. This requires a second order Ward identity and the use of the evolution equation. Our result also illustrates a subtle difference between conformal perturbation theory and the slow roll expansion.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1211.2157,
  title  = {Consistency condition for inflation from (broken) conformal symmetry},
  author = {Koenraad Schalm and Gary Shiu and Ted van der Aalst},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1211.2157},
  year   = {2013}
}

Comments

13 pages, 2 figures; v2, published version

R2 v1 2026-06-21T22:35:36.262Z