Related papers: Phases of Inflation
Axions play a central role in many realizations of large field models of inflation and in recent alternative mechanisms for generating primordial tensor modes in small field models. If these axions couple to gauge fields, the coupling…
In this work, we present results of numerical simulations of the Chern-Simons Inflation Model proposed by Alexander, Marciano and Spergel. According to this model, inflation begins with a fermion condensate interacting with a gauge field.…
We analyze string-theoretic large-field inflation in the regime of spontaneously-broken supergravity with conventional moduli stabilization by fluxes and non-perturbative effects. The main ingredient is a shift-symmetric Kahler potential,…
The electric Weak Gravity Conjecture demands that axions with large decay constant $f$ couple to light instantons. The resulting large instantonic corrections pose problems for natural inflation. We explore an alternative argument based on…
We study the dynamics of a homogeneous, isotropic, and positively curved universe in the presence of a SU(2) gauge field or a triplet of mutually orthogonal vector fields. In the SU(2) case we use the previously known ansatz for the…
A Chern-Simons interaction between a pseudo-scalar field and a U(1) gauge field results in the generation of a chiral gravitational wave background. The detection of this signal is contrasted by the fact that this coupling also generates…
We propose a new type of axion inflation with complex structure moduli in the framework of type IIB superstring theory compactified on Calabi-Yau manifold. The inflaton is identified as the axion for the complex structure moduli whose…
We illustrate a framework for constructing models of chaotic inflation where the inflaton is the position of a D3 brane along the universal cover of a string compactification. In our scenario, a brane rolls many times around a non-trivial…
We propose a novel inflationary scenario in string theory in which the inflaton field is a 'Wilson line' degree of freedom in the worldvolume of a probe Dp-brane, in a warped flux compactification. Kinetic terms for Wilson line fields on…
We present a mechanism for realizing hybrid inflation using two axion fields with a purely non-perturbatively generated scalar potential. The structure of scalar potential is highly constrained by the discrete shift symmetries of the…
Non-abelian discrete gauge symmetries can provide the inflaton with a flat potential even when one takes into account gravitational strength effects. The discreteness of the symmetries also provide special field values where inflation can…
We provide a detailed study of natural inflation with a periodic non-minimal coupling, which is a well-motivated inflationary model that admits an explicit UV completion. We demonstrate that this construction can satisfy the most recent…
We derive constraints facing models of axion inflation based on decay constant alignment from a string-theoretic and quantum gravitational perspective. In particular, we investigate the prospects for alignment and `anti-alignment' of $C_4$…
We review a string-inspired model of inflation which is a consequence of condensates of chiral gravitational waves (GW) in the primordial Universe, leading in turn to a (approximately) constant condensate of a gravitational anomaly term of…
We apply the Effective Field Theory of Inflation to study the case where the continuous shift symmetry of the Goldstone boson \pi is softly broken to a discrete subgroup. This case includes and generalizes recently proposed String Theory…
We explore a model of a pseudo-Nambu-Goldstone boson inflaton field coupled to a non-Abelian $SU(2)$ gauge field. This model naturally leads to a warm inflation scenario, where the inflationary dynamics is dominated by thermal dissipation.…
Slow-roll inflation is a successful paradigm. However we find that even a small coupling of the inflaton to other light fields can dramatically alter the dynamics and predictions of inflation. As an example, the inflaton can generically…
We present an intrinsic leptogenesis mechanism in models of axion inflation with a classical SU(2) gauge field. The gauge field is coupled to the axion with a Chern-Simons interaction and comprises a tiny fraction of the total energy,…
We consider an UV-protected Natural Inflation scenario involving Chern-Simons-like interactions between the inflaton and some beyond the Standard Model gauge fields. The accelerated expansion of the Universe is supported by a combination of…
Models of axion inflation are particularly interesting since they provide a natural justification for the flatness of the potential over a super-Planckian distance, namely the approximate shift-symmetry of the inflaton. In addition, most of…