Related papers: Enhancing non-Gaussianities by breaking local Lore…
We investigate primordial perturbations and non-gaussianities in the Ho\v{r}ava-Lifshitz theory of gravitation. In the UV limit, the scalar perturbation in the Ho\v{r}ava theory is naturally scale-invariant, ignoring the details of the…
For most initial conditions, cosmologically relevant physical modes were trans-planckian at the bounce time, often by many magnitude orders. We improve the usual loop quantum cosmology calculation of the primordial power spectra -- in the…
Cosmological inflation generates a spectrum of density perturbations that can seed the cosmic structures we observe today. These perturbations are usually computed as the result of the gravitationally-induced spontaneous creation of…
We generalize a recently proposed mechanism for the origin of primordial metric perturbations in inflationary models. Quantum fluctuations of light scalar fields during inflation give rise to super-horizon fluctuations of masses and…
A new class of inflationary attractors characterized by a strongly non-geodesic motion has been discovered and explored in the past few years. I describe how they naturally arise in negatively curved field space, allowing to inflate on…
A Lifshitz scalar with the dynamical critical exponent z = 3 obtains scale-invariant, super-horizon field fluctuations without the need of an inflationary era. Since this mechanism is due to the special scaling of the Lifshitz scalar and…
The abundance of primordial black holes changes in the presence of local non-Gaussianity. A positive non-linear parameter $f_{NL}$ increases the abundance while a negative one reduces it. We show that in non-attractor single-field models of…
We study the behavior of n-point functions of the primordial curvature perturbations, assuming our observed Universe is only a subset of a larger space with statistically homogeneous and isotropic perturbations. If the larger space has…
Scalar metric fluctuations generically source a spectrum of gravitational waves at second order in perturbation theory, poising gravitational wave experiments as potentially powerful probes of the small-scale curvature power spectrum. We…
One-loop correction to the power spectrum in generic single-field inflation is calculated by using standard perturbation theory. Because of the enhancement inversely proportional to the observed red tilt of the spectral index of curvature…
We derive a new soft theorem that corresponds to the spontaneous breaking of Lorentz boosts. This is motivated by the dynamics of inflation in the sub-horizon (flat-space) limit, where spacetime becomes flat but Lorentz boosts are still…
We analyze primordial non-Gaussianity in single field inflationary models when the tensor/scalar ratio is large. Our results show that detectable levels of non-Gaussianity $f_{NL} \sim 50$ are still possible in the simplest class of models…
The statistics of primordial curvature fluctuations are our window into the period of inflation, where these fluctuations were generated. To date, the cosmic microwave background has been the dominant source of information about these…
In the present thesis, using an effective field theory point of view, we explore theories of single-field inflation where higher derivative operators become relevant, affecting in a novel way the dynamics and therefore the observations. For…
We study a class of non-local, purely gravitational models which have the correct structure to reproduce the leading infrared logarithms of quantum gravitational back-reaction during the inflationary regime. These models end inflation in a…
Non-linear interactions during inflation generate non-Gaussianities in the distribution of primordial curvature. In many theories, the physics is scale-invariant, such that the induced three-point function depends solely on a dimensionless…
A scalar field rolling down a potential with a large initial velocity results in inflation of a finite duration. Such a scenario suppresses the scalar power on large scales improving the fit to the cosmological data. We find that the…
We consider the classical fluctuations of the gravitational constant generated by bubbles in the inflationary universe. For extended inflation, we demonstrate numerically how and how large fluctuations are produced during bubble expansion.…
We use lattice simulations to examine the detailed dynamics of inflaton fragmentation during and after preheating in $\lambda \phi^4$ chaotic inflation. The dynamics are qualitatively similar to preheating after $m^2 \phi^2$ inflation,…
We consider the Gauss-Bonnet term coupled to the inflaton in the Palatini formulation of gravity. Unlike in the metric formulation, the Gauss-Bonnet term is not always a total derivative. We solve for the connection and insert it into the…