Related papers: Integrating out Heavy Fields in Inflation
We consider a simple extension of the Standard Model Higgs inflation with one new real scalar field which preserves unitarity up to the Planck scale. The new scalar field (called sigma) completes in the ultraviolet the theory of Higgs…
The physics of the inflationary universe requires the study of the out of equilibrium evolution of quantum fields in curved spacetime. We present the evolution for both the geometry and the matter (described by the quantum inflaton field)…
We introduce a second-order stochastic effective theory for light scalar fields in de Sitter spacetime, extending the validity of the stochastic approach beyond the massless limit and demonstrating how it can be used to compute…
We derive a Higgs inflationary model in the context of holographic cosmology, where we consider a universe filled with a Higgs field non-minimally coupled to gravity in a slow-roll regime. The amplitude of density (scalar) perturbations is…
In order to go beyond the mean-field approximation, commonly used in the inflationary computations, an identification of the quantum constituents of the inflationary background is made. In particular, the homogeneous scalar field…
In a recently proposed scenario for primordial inflation, where the Standard Model (SM) Higgs boson plays a role of the inflation field, an effective field theory (EFT) approach is the most convenient for working out the consequences of…
If cosmic inflation was driven by an electrically neutral scalar field stable on cosmological time scales, the field necessarily constitutes all or part of dark matter (DM). We study this possibility in a scenario where the inflaton field…
In loop quantum cosmology there may be a super-inflation phase in the very early universe, in which a single scalar field with a negative power-law potential $V= -M^4(\phi/M)^\beta$ plays important roles. Since the effective horizon…
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 investigate models in which the inflaton emerges as a composite field of a four dimensional, strongly interacting and nonsupersymmetric gauge theory featuring purely fermionic matter. We show that it is possible to obtain successful…
A method of calculating the vacuum effective action for massive quantum fields in curved space-time is outlined. Our approach is based on the conformal representation of the fields action and on the integration of the corresponding…
We review the effects of heavy scalar fields during inflation in the framework of $\mathcal N = 1$ supergravity. Such heavy scalars can be geometric moduli from string compactifications or stabilizer fields from a different sector of the…
The simplicity of the CMB data, so well described by single-field inflation, raises the question whether there might be an equally simple multi-field realization consistent with the observations. We explore the idea that an approximate…
An oscillating inflaton field induces small amplitude oscillations of the Hubble parameter at the end of inflation. These Hubble parameter induced oscillations, in turn, trigger parametric particle production of all light fields, even if…
We consider a massive scalar field with quartic self-interaction $\lambda/4!\,\phi^4$ in de~Sitter spacetime and present a diagrammatic expansion that describes the field as driven by stochastic noise. This is compared with the Feynman…
We explore the possibility to make use of cosmological data to look for signatures of unknown heavy particles whose masses are on the order of the Hubble parameter during the time of inflation. To be more specific we take up the…
During inflation, there is a preferred reference frame in which the expansion of the background spacetime is spatially isotropic. In contrast to Minkowski spacetime, observables can depend on the velocity of the system with respect to this…
We analyze the signatures of inflationary models that are coupled to strongly interacting field theories, a basic class of multifield models also motivated by their role in providing dynamically small scales. Near the squeezed limit of the…
We present a model which contains a new complex scalar field $\Psi$, interacting with a new real scalar field, $\chi$, and an effective potential whose symmetry is almost exact, being explicitly broken by Planck-scale effects. We study the…
We discuss a new scenario for early cosmology when the inflationary de Sitter phase emerges dynamically. This genuine quantum effect occurs as a result of dynamics of the topologically nontrivial sectors in a strongly coupled QCD- like…