Related papers: Cosmological Fluctuations from Infra-Red Cascading…
We consider inflation in a universe with a positive cosmological constant and a nonminimally coupled scalar field, in which the field couples both quadratically and quartically to the Ricci scalar. When considered in the Einstein frame and…
This thesis is centered on three main subjects within the theory of inflation and cosmological perturbations: loop corrections to the power spectrum of curvature fluctuations generated during inflation; evolution of cosmological…
Following inflation, the Universe may pass through an early matter-dominated phase supported by the oscillating inflaton condensate. Initially small fluctuations in the condensate grow gravitationally on subhorizon scales and can collapse…
A particularly attractive feature of inflation is that quantum fluctuations in the inflaton field may have seeded inhomogeneities in the cosmic microwave background (CMB) and the formation of large-scale structure. In this paper, we…
We study a model of inflation in which a scalar field $\chi$ is non-minimally coupled to Starobinsky's $R^2$ gravity. After transforming it to the Einstein frame, a new scalar field, the scalaron $\phi$, will appear and couple to $\chi$…
The curvaton scenario for the generation of the cosmological curvature perturbation on large scales represents an alternative to the standard slow-roll scenario of inflation in which the observed density perturbations are due to…
Typically the fluctuations generated from a decaying field during inflation do not contribute to the large scale structures. In this paper we provide an example where it is possible for a field which slowly rolls and then decays during…
In inflationary cosmology, the particles constituting the Universe are created after inflation in the process of reheating due to the interaction with the oscillating inflaton field. We briefly review the basics of the slow reheating, and…
We study the cosmic density perturbations induced from fluctuation of the amplitude of late-decaying scalar condensations (called \phi) in the scenario where the scalar field \phi once dominates the universe. In such a scenario, the cosmic…
Massive particles produced during inflation impact soft limits of primordial correlators. Searching for these signatures presents an exciting opportunity to uncover the particle spectrum in the inflationary epoch. We present…
We study a variant of the Chromo-Natural Inflation (CNI) mechanism in which the inflaton interacts only gravitationally with the CNI fields. Integrating out all the non-dynamical scalar fields of the model results in a coupling between the…
The physics during the inflationary stage of the universe is of quantum nature involving extremely high energy densities. Moreover, it is out of equilibrium on a fastly expanding dynamical geometry.We present in these lectures…
We revisit the study of the phenomenology associated to a burst of particle production of a field whose mass is controlled by the inflaton field and vanishes at one given instance during inflation. This generates a bump in the correlators…
We study the problem of scalar particle production after inflation by a rapidly oscillating inflaton field. We use the framework of the chaotic inflation scenario with quartic and quadratic inflaton potentials. Particular attention is paid…
Inflaton couplings during warm inflation result in the production of a thermal bath. Thermal friction and fluctuations can dominate the standard de Sitter analogues, resulting in a modified slow-roll scenario with a new source of density…
The density perturbations generated when the inflaton decay rate is perturbed by a light scalar field $\chi$ are studied. By explicitly solving the perturbation equations for the system of two scalar fields and radiation, we show that even…
We present a scenario where a $Z_2$-symmetric scalar field $\phi$ first drives cosmic inflation, then reheats the Universe but remains out-of-equilibrium itself, and finally comprises the observed dark matter abundance, produced by particle…
Recently, we have performed research on the subject of the cosmological constant problem. The scenario is based on two postulates for inflationary theory: one is that inflaton $\phi$ can interact with radiation (relativistic particles); the…
A model of cosmological inflation is proposed in which field space is a hyperbolic plane. The inflaton never slow-rolls, and instead orbits the bottom of the potential, buoyed by a centrifugal force. Though initial velocities redshift away…
In the framework of Born-Infeld inspired gravity theories, which deviates from General Relativity (GR) in the high curvature regime, we discuss the viability of Cosmic Inflation without scalar fields. For energy densities higher than the…