Related papers: Inflation near a metastable de Sitter vacuum from …
We study moduli stabilization for type IIB orientifolds compactified on Calabi-Yau threefolds in the region close to conifold singularities in the complex structure moduli space. The form of the periods implies new phenomena like…
Based on random matrix theory, we compute the likelihood of saddles and minima in a class of random potentials that are softly bounded from above and below, as required for the validity of low energy effective theories. Imposing this bound…
Cosmological inflation gives a natural answer for a variety of cosmological questions, including the horizon problem, the flatness problem, and others. However, inflation yields new questions relating to the flatness of the inflaton…
We investigate the parameter space of hybrid inflation models where inflation terminates via a first-order phase transition causing nucleation of bubbles. Such models experience a tension from the need to ensure nearly scale invariant…
The measured Standard Model parameters lie in a range such that the Higgs potential, once extrapolated up to high scales, develops a minimum of negative energy density. This has important cosmological implications. In particular, during…
We study the back-reaction of moduli fields on the inflaton potential in generic models of F-term inflation. We derive the moduli corrections as a power series in the ratio of Hubble scale and modulus mass. The general result is illustrated…
Using the dS/QFT correspondence in the context of inflation allows for the study of interesting, otherwise inaccessible physics. In particular, by studying inflation via its dual field theory at the boundary of the de Sitter space, it may…
We present a consistent low energy effective field theory framework for parameterizing the effects of novel short distance physics in inflation, and their possible observational signatures in the Cosmic Microwave Background. We consider the…
The flat directions LLe and udd within the minimal supersymmetric Standard Model provide all the necessary ingredients for a successful inflation with the right amplitude of the scalar density perturbations, negligible gravity waves and the…
Experimental data suggest that the Higgs potential has a lower ground state at high field values. Consequently, decaying from the electroweak to the true vacuum nucleates bubbles that expand rapidly and can have dire consequences for our…
Starting from Einstein-Yang-Mills in higher dimensions with an instanton on a compact sphere, we dimensionally reduce to find an effective four-dimensional action describing "hilltop" inflation. Using recent CMB data, we analyse the…
Last year we argued that if slow-roll inflation followed the decay of a false vacuum in a large landscape, the steepening of the scalar potential between the inflationary plateau and the barrier generically leads to a potentially observable…
Within the Standard Model, the current Higgs and top quark data favor metastability of the electroweak vacuum, although the uncertainties are still significant. The true vacuum is many orders of magnitude deeper than ours and the barrier…
We show that under general conditions there is at least one natural inflationary direction for the Kahler moduli of type IIB flux compactifications. This requires a Calabi-Yau which has h^{2,1}>h^{1,1}>2 and for which the structure of the…
We investigate the dynamics of the Higgs field at the end of inflation in the minimal scenario consisting of an inflaton field coupled to the Standard Model only through the non-minimal gravitational coupling $\xi$ of the Higgs field. Such…
We consider a multidimensional cosmological model with nonlinear quadratic $R^2$ and quartic $R^4$ actions. As a matter source, we include a monopole form field, D-dimensional bare cosmological constant and tensions of branes located in…
We show that in any model of non-eternal inflation satisfying the null energy condition, the area of the de Sitter horizon increases by at least one Planck unit in each inflationary e-folding. This observation gives an operational meaning…
We show, within the single-field inflationary paradigm, that a linear non-minimal interaction $\xi\,M_P\,\phi\,R$ between the inflaton field $\phi$ and the Ricci scalar $R$ can result in successful inflation that concludes with an efficient…
In the present paper, we reexamine the moduli stabilization problem of the Type IIB orientifolds with one complex structure modulus in a modified two-step procedure. The full superpotential including both the 3-form fluxes and the…
We construct a string-inspired nonsingular cosmological scenario in which an inflaton field is driven up the potential before the graceful exit by employing a low-energy string effective action with an orbifold compactification. This sets…