Related papers: Can Back-Reaction Prevent Eternal Inflation?
It is becoming increasingly clear that large but rare fluctuations of the primordial curvature field, controlled by the tail of its probability distribution, could have dramatic effects on the current structure of the universe -- {\it e.g.}…
Inflation may have been driven by a component which violated the Null-Energy Condition, thereby leading to {\it super inflation}. We provide the formalism to study cosmological perturbations when such a component is described by a scalar…
Eternal inflation, the idea that there is always a part of the universe that is expanding exponentially, is a frequent feature of inflationary models. It has been argued that eternal inflation requires the violation of energy conditions,…
We study chaotic inflation driven by a real, massive, homogeneous minimally coupled scalar field in a flat Robertson-Walker spacetime. The semiclassical limit for gravity is considered, whereas the scalar field is treated quantum…
The lack of correlations at the long-wavelength scales of the cosmic microwave background spectrum is a long-standing puzzle and it persists in the latest Planck data. By considering the Hartle-Hawking no-boundary wave function as the…
Working in the Large Volume Scenario (LVS) of IIB Calabi-Yau flux compactifications, we construct inflationary models from recently computed higher derivative $(\alpha')^3$-corrections. Inflation is driven by a Kaehler modulus whose…
Eternal inflation is studied in the context of warm inflation. We focus on different tools to analyze the effects of dissipation and the presence of a thermal radiation bath on the fluctuation-dominated regime, for which the…
It has been suggested that the effects of renormalization significantly reduce the amplitude of the inflationary spectra at scales measurable in the cosmic microwave background. Via a gauge-invariant analysis, we compute the renormalized…
We consider the backreaction of the long wavelength tensor modes produced during a slow-roll inflationary regime driven by a single scalar field in a spatially flat Friedmann-Lema\^{\i}tre-Robertson-Walker background geometry. We…
The continual production of gravitons during inflation endows loop corrections with secular logarithms which grow nonperturbatively large during a prolonged period of inflation. The physics behind these effects is reviewed, along with a…
A gauge-independent, invariant theory of linear scalar perturbations of inflation and gravitational fields has been created. This invariant theory allows one to compare gauges used in the work of other researchers and to find the…
We show that Bogoliubov excited scalar and tensor modes do not alleviate Planckian evolution during inflation if one assumes that $r$ and the Bogoliubov coefficients are approximately scale invariant. We constrain the excitation parameter…
If the spatial curvature of the universe is positive, then the curvature term will always dominate at early enough times in a slow-rolling inflationary epoch. This enhances inflationary effects and hence puts limits on the possible number…
For the models of inflation driven by the potential energy of an inflaton field $\phi$, the covariant Galileon Lagrangian $(\partial\phi)^2\Box \phi$ generally works to slow down the evolution of the field. On the other hand, if the…
There exists a variety of exact solutions of the scalar field Einstein equations, allowing for ``phantom regions'' with the negative kinetic field term. These regions can be cut out, their boundaries being sewn together in such a way that…
The effects of bulk viscosity are examined for inflationary dynamics in which dissipation and thermalization are present. A complete stability analysis is done for the background inflaton evolution equations, which includes both inflaton…
Inflation generically produces primordial gravitational waves with a red spectral tilt. In this paper we calculate the backreaction produced by these gravitational waves on the expansion of the universe. We find that in radiation domination…
We consider the effects of the curvaton, late-decaying scalar condensation, to observational constraints on inflation models. From current observations of cosmic density fluctuations, severe constraints on some class of inflation models are…
Inflection point inflation generically includes a deviation from slow-roll when the inflaton approaches the inflection point. Such deviations are shown to be generated by transitions between singular trajectories. The effects on the power…
We revisit the Lagrangian formulation of stochastic inflation, where the path-integral approach is employed to derive the Langevin equation governing the dynamics of long-wavelength fields, in contrast to the standard method where the…