Related papers: Inflation without Selfreproduction
Inflation is a promising solution to many problems of the standard Big-Bang cosmology. Nevertheless, inflationary models have proved less compelling. In this chapter, we discuss why supersymmetry has led to more natural models of inflation.…
Inflation is an early period of accelerated cosmic expansion, thought to be sourced by high energy physics. A key task today is to use the influx of increasingly precise observational data to constrain the plethora of inflationary models…
In the hope of avoiding model dependence of the cosmological observables, phenomenological parametrizations of Cosmic Inflation have recently been proposed. Typically, they are expressed in terms of two parameters associated with an…
We present a novel background-independent framework for cosmic inflation, starting with a matrix model. In this framework, inflation is portrayed as a dynamic process responsible for the generation of both space and time. This stands in…
We propose an explanation for the present accelerated expansion of the universe that does not invoke dark energy or a modification of gravity and is firmly rooted in inflationary cosmology.
Cosmic inflation is envisioned as the ``most likely'' start for the observed universe. To give substance to this claim, a framework is needed in which inflation can compete with other scenarios and the relative likelihood of all scenarios…
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…
A scenario with two subsequent periods of inflationary expansion in the very early universe is examined. The model is based on a potential motivated by symmetries being found in field theory at high energy. For various parameter sets of the…
Extended inflation is a promising new approach to implementing the inflationary universe scenario. This paper reviews recent advances including a new, more robust mechanism for ending extended inflation, a new prediction for the density…
In the framework of scalar-tensor theories of gravity, we construct a new kind of cosmological model that conflates inflation and ekpyrosis. During a phase of conflation, the universe undergoes accelerated expansion, but with crucial…
At its very beginning, the universe is believed to have grown exponentially in size via the mechanism of inflation. The almost scale-invariant density perturbation spectrum predicted by inflation is strongly supported by cosmological…
The leading account of several salient observable features of our universe today is provided by the theory of cosmic inflation. But an important and thus far intractable question is whether inflation is generic, or whether it is finely…
Inflation is known to be generically eternal to the future: the false vacuum is thermalized in some regions of space, while inflation continues in other regions. Here, we address the question of whether inflation can also be eternal to the…
We provide a realisation of a singularity-free inflationary universe in the form of a simple cosmological model dominated at early times by a single minimally coupled scalar field with a physically based potential. The universe starts…
I summarize the arguments that strongly suggest that our universe is the product of inflation. The mechanisms that lead to eternal inflation in both new and chaotic models are described. Although the infinity of pocket universes produced by…
A novel scalar field free approach to cosmic inflation is presented. The inflationary Universe and the radiation dominated Universe are shown, within the framework of unified brane cosmology, to be two different phases governed by one and…
We propose a cosmological lingering phase for the initial state prior to inflation which would help address the singularity problem of inflation. The universe begins with a constant (Hagedorn) temperature and then transitions into an…
We develop a cosmological model where primordial inflation is driven by a 'solid', defined as a system of three derivatively coupled scalar fields obeying certain symmetries and spontaneously breaking a certain subgroup of these. The…
We contrast the possibility of inflation starting a) from the universe's inception or b) from an earlier non-inflationary state. Neither case is ideal since a) assumes quantum mechanical reasoning is straightforwardly applicable to the…
The basic workings of inflationary models are summarized, along with the arguments that strongly suggest that our universe is the product of inflation. It is argued that essentially all inflationary models lead to (future-)eternal…