Related papers: Spinodal Instabilities and Super-Planckian Excursi…
Slow-roll inflation requires the inflaton field to have an exceptionally flat potential, which combined with measurements of the scale of inflation demands some degree of fine-tuning. Alternatively, the flatness of the potential could be…
Pseudo-Goldstone bosons (pGBs) can provide technically natural inflatons, as has been comparatively well-explored in the simplest axion examples. Although inflationary success requires trans-Planckian decay constants, f > Mp, several…
In Natural Inflation, the Inflaton is a pseudo-Nambu-Goldstone boson which acquires a mass by explicit breaking of a global shift symmetry at scale f. In this case, for small field values, the potential is flat and stable under radiative…
We re-examine the original model of Natural inflation, in which the inflaton is a pseudo Nambu-Goldstone boson with potential of the form $ V(\phi) = \Lambda^4 [1 \pm \cos(\phi/f)]$, in light of recent data. We find that the model is alive…
A pseudo Nambu-Goldstone boson (such as an axion-like particle) is a theoretically well-motivated inflaton as it features a naturally flat potential (natural inflation). This is because Goldstone's theorem protects its potential from…
In natural inflation models, the inflaton is a pseudo Nambu-Goldstone boson and the flatness of the potential is protected by shift symmetries. In this framework, a successful inflation requires the global symmetry to be spontaneously…
We study how to obtain a sufficiently flat inflaton potential that is natural from the particle physics point of view. Supersymmetry, which is broken during inflation, cannot protect the potential against non-renormalizable operators…
We show how the inclusion of non-perturbative, {\em dynamical} quantum effects on the evolution of the inflaton can allow for an inflationary phase that is both consistent with cosmological constraints {\em and} avoids the problems…
We analyze a model of hybrid natural inflation based on the smallest non-Abelian discrete group S_3. Leading invariant terms in the scalar potential have an accidental global symmetry that is spontaneously broken, providing a…
We consider here natural inflation in the low energy (two-derivative) metric-affine theory containing only the minimal degrees of freedom in the inflationary sector, i.e. the massless graviton and the pseudo-Nambu-Goldstone boson (PNGB).…
We analyse the dynamics of spinodal decomposition in inflationary cosmology using the closed time path formalism of out of equilibrium quantum field theory combined with the non-perturbative Hartree approximation. In addition to a general…
A pseudo-Nambu-Goldstone boson, with a potential of the form $ V(\phi) = \Lambda^4 [1 + \cos(\phi/f)]$, can naturally give rise to an epoch of inflation in the early universe (Freese, Frieman, and Olinto 1990). The potential is naturally…
We investigate a particular type of curvaton mechanism, under which inflation can occur at Hubble scale of order 1 TeV. The curvaton is a pseudo Nambu-Goldstone boson, whose order parameter increases after a phase transition during…
We propose a natural inflation model driven by an imaginary or axionic component of a K\"ahler modulus in string-inspired supergravity. The shift symmetry of the axion is gauged under an anomalous $U(1)_X$ symmetry, which leads to a…
Recent observations of the cosmic microwave background (CMB) indicate that a successful theory of cosmological inflation needs to have flat potential of the inflaton scalar field. Realizing the inflaton to be a pseudo-Nambu Goldstone boson…
Natural inflation driven by Pseudo-Nambu-Goldstone bosons have a problem that the nearly scale invariant spectrum of density perturbations is attained only when the symmetry breaking scale is of the order of Planck scale. We show here that…
A spontaneously broken global discrete symmetry may have pseudo Goldstone modes associated with the spontaneous breaking of the approximate continuous symmetry of the low dimension terms in the Lagrangian. These provide natural candidates…
Natural (axionic) inflation can accommodate sizeable primordial tensor modes but suffers from the necessity of trans-Planckian variations of the inflaton field. This problem can be solved via the mechanism of aligned axions…
We study moduli stabilization in combination with inflation in heterotic orbifold compactifications in the light of a large Hubble scale and the favored tensor-to-scalar ratio $r \approx 0.05$. To account for a trans-Planckian field range…
We propose an inflationary scenario based on a many-flavor hidden QCD with eight flavors, which realizes the almost scale-invariant (walking) gauge dynamics. The theory predicts two types of composite (pseudo) Nambu-Goldstone bosons, the…