Related papers: Circumventing the eta problem in building an infla…

We investigate, in a model-independent way, the conditions required to obtain a satisfactory model of extended inflation in which inflation is brought to an end by a first-order phase transition. The constraints are that the correct present…

The influence of higher-order terms in the K\"{a}hler potential of the supergravity D-term inflation model on the density perturbation is studied. We show that these terms can make the inflaton potential flatter, which lowers the energy…

This short note emphasises a potential tension between string models of inflation based on systems of branes and antibranes and the spectrum of strings in curved space, in particular the requirement that the leading Regge trajectory extends…

We study the evolution of scalar curvature perturbations in a brane-world inflation model in a 5D Anti-de Sitter spacetime. The inflaton perturbations are confined to a 4D brane but they are coupled to the 5D bulk metric perturbations. We…

We study N=1 Supergravity inflation in the context of the braneworld scenario. Particular attention is paid to the problem of the onset of inflation at sub-Planckian field values and the ensued inflationary observables. We find that the…

Wrapped branes in string compactifications introduce a monodromy that extends the field range of individual closed-string axions to beyond the Planck scale. Furthermore, approximate shift symmetries of the system naturally control…

The main problem of inflation in string theory is finding the models with a flat potential, consistent with stabilization of the volume of the compactified space. This can be achieved in the theories where the potential has (an approximate)…

We study models of modular inflation of the form expected to arise from low energy effective actions of superstring theories. We argue on general grounds that the most likely models of modular slow-roll inflation are small field models in…

We construct a string-inspired nonsingular cosmological scenario in which an inflaton field is driven up the potential before the graceful exit by employing a low-energy string effective action with an orbifold compactification. This sets…

We examine extended inflation models enhanced by the addition of a coupling between the inflaton field and the space-time curvature. We examine two types of model, where the underlying inflaton potential takes on second-order and…

We present a model of slow-roll inflation in the context of effective Supergravities arising from string theories. The uplifting of the potential (to generate dS or Minkowski vacua) is provided by the D-term associated to an anomalous U(1),…

We propose a stringy version of the old inflation scenario which does not require any slow-roll inflaton potential and is based on a specific example of string compatification with warped metric. Our set-up admits the presence of…

We investigate a new way of realizing a period of cosmological inflation in the context of brane gas cosmology. It is argued that a gas of co-dimension one branes, out of thermal equilibrium with the rest of the matter, has an equation of…

If a coupling between the inflaton and the Gauss-Bonnet term is introduced, many models of inflation that were ruled out by the most recent Planck data can be made viable again. The predictions for the scalar spectral index and…

A characteristic of D-brane inflation is that fluctuations in the inflaton field can propagate at a speed significantly less than the speed of light. This yields observable effects that are distinct from those of single-field slow roll…

We present a curvaton model from type IIB string theory compactified on a warped throat with approximate isometries. Considering an (anti-)D3-brane sitting at the throat tip as a prototype standard model brane, we show that the brane's…

In this thesis, consisting of two main parts, we study observational signatures of cosmic (super)strings in the context of D-brane inflation and properties of scalar perturbations on generic homogeneous inflating backgrounds. In the first…

A long period of inflation can be triggered when the inflaton is held up on the top of a steep potential by the infrared end of a warped space. We first study the field theory description of such a model. We then embed it in the flux…

A supersymmetric inflationary stage dominated by an $F$-term has the problem that the flatness of the potential is spoiled by supergravity corrections, that is the slow-roll parameter $\eta$ gets contributions of order unity. We show that…

As a first step towards inflation in genuinely F-theoretic setups, we propose a scenario where the inflaton is the relative position of two 7-branes on holomorphic 4-cycles. Non-supersymmetric gauge flux induces an attractive inter-brane…