Related papers: Eternal Inflation with Arrival Terminals

We review cosmological inflation and its realization in quantum field theory and in string theory. This material is a portion of a book, also entitled "Inflation and String Theory", to be published by Cambridge University Press.

In this paper, we consider a nonminimal coupling model between gravity and nonlinear electrodynamics with cosmological constant. This cosmological model is designed to account for both the inflationary epoch of the early universe and the…

In this paper we present the problem of quantum to classical transition of quantum fluctuations during inflation and in particular the question of evolution of entanglement. After a general introduction, three specific very recent works are…

The swampland criteria put significant constraints on inflation models. In this paper, I show that hilltop inflation on the brane may provide an initial condition for hilltop inflation and produce topological eternal inflation without…

The inflationary scenario has become the paradigm of early universe cosmology, and - in conjuction with ideas from superstring theory - has led to speculations about an "inflationary multiverse". From a point of view of phenomenology, the…

Theories of the cosmological constant fall into two classes, those in which the vacuum energy is fixed by the fundamental theory and those in which it is adjustable in some way. For each class we discuss key challenges. The string theory…

Inflationary models, especially those with plateau-type potentials, are consistent with the cosmological data, but inflation itself does not resolve the initial singularity. This singularity is resolved, for example, by the idea of the…

The next generation of gravitational wave detectors holds out the prospect of detecting a stochastic gravitational background generated in the very early universe. In this article, we review the various cosmological processes which can lead…

We argue that in the context of string theory a large number N of connected degenerate vacua that mix will lead to a ground state with much lower energy, essentially because of the standard level repulsion of quantum theory for the…

We consider the possibility of realizing inflation in nonlocal field theories containing infinitely many derivatives. Such constructions arise naturally in string field theory and also in a number of toy models, such as the p-adic string.…

We consider vacuum tunneling of a new kind where the false vacua are not translationally invariant, but have topological defects that break some of their translational symmetries. In the particular case where the topological defects are…

We consider an inflationary scenario where the energy scale of inflation stems from gauge theory dynamics. We point out its generic implications on vacuum selection of our universe, in particular, on determination of spacetime symmetries…

We argue that theories with multiple axions generically contain a large number of vacua that can account for the smallness of the cosmological constant. In a theory with N axions, the dominant instantons with charges Q determine the…

In pursuing the intriguing resemblance of the Einstein equations to thermodynamic equations, most sharply seen in systems possessing horizons, we suggest that eternal inflation of the stochastic type may be a fruitful phenomenon to explore.…

This paper studies a finite-horizon portfolio selection problem with non-concave terminal utility and proportional transaction costs, in which the commonly used concavification principle for terminal value is no longer applicable. We…

After a pedagogical review of elementary cosmology, I go on to discuss some obstacles to obtaining inflationary or accelerating universes in M/String Theory. In particular, I give an account of an old No-Go Theorem to this effect. I then…

Although the paradigm of inflation has been extensively studied to demonstrate how macroscopic inhomogeneities in our universe originate from quantum fluctuations, most of the established literature ignores the crucial role that…

The usual theory of inflation breaks down in eternal inflation. We derive a dual description of eternal inflation in terms of a deformed Euclidean CFT located at the threshold of eternal inflation. The partition function gives the amplitude…

Future cosmological surveys will probe the expansion history of the universe and constrain phenomenological models of dark energy. Such models do not address the fine-tuning problem of the vacuum energy, i.e. the cosmological constant…

We study some aspects of fine tuning in inflationary scenarios within string theory flux compactifications and, in particular, in models of accidental inflation. We investigate the possibility that the apparent fine-tuning of the low energy…