Related papers: TwInflation
In the standard cosmological picture the Universe underwent a brief period of near-exponential expansion, known as Inflation. This provides an explanation for structure formation through the amplification of perturbations by the rapid…
We examine a wide class of multi-field inflationary models based on fields that decay or stabilize during inflation in a staggered fashion. The fields driving assisted inflation are on flat, short stretches, before they encounter a sharp…
The BICEP2 observation of a large tensor-to-scalar ratio, $r = 0.20^{+0.07}_{-0.05}$, implies that the inflaton $\phi$ in single-field inflation models must satisfy $\phi \sim 10M_{Pl}$ in order to produce sufficient inflation. This is a…
We review experimental and theoretical developments in inflation and its application to structure formation, including the curvaton idea. We then discuss a particle physics model of supersymmetric hybrid inflation at the intermediate scale…
Global topological defects may account for the large cold spot observed in the Cosmic Microwave Background. We explore possibilities of constructing models of supersymmetric F-term hybrid inflation, where the waterfall fields are globally…
We consider D-term inflation for small couplings of the inflaton to matter fields. Standard hybrid inflation then ends at a critical value of the inflaton field that exceeds the Planck mass. During the subsequent waterfall transition the…
We present the first quantum field theory model of inflation that is renormalizable in the matter sector, with a super-Hubble inflaton mass and sub-Planckian field excursions, which is thus technically natural and consistent with a…
The scale at which supersymmetry is broken and the mechanism by which supersymmetry breaking is fed down to the observable sector has rich implications on the way Nature may have chosen to accomplish inflation. We discuss a simple model for…
Cosmological inflation is the dominating paradigm to account for observations of the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB). In this thesis, we study the phenomenology of a class of particularly well motivated models of inflation, known under…
We study symmetry-breaking inflation within the framework of metric-affine gravity. By introducing a non-minimal coupling, $\beta(\phi)\tilde{\cal R}$, between the Holst invariant and the inflaton, both small-field and large-field…
A perturbative strategy for inflation described by two-inflaton fields is developed using a mathematical analogy with the renormalization-group. Two small quantities, $\alpha$ and $\lambda$, corresponding to standard slow-roll parameters…
We consider the most minimal scale invariant extension of the standard model that allows for successful radiative electroweak symmetry breaking and inflation. The framework involves an extra scalar singlet, that plays the r\^ole of the…
We here explore a specific class of scalar field, dubbed quasi-quintessence which exhibits characteristics akin to ordinary matter. Specifically, we investigate under which conditions this fluid can mitigate the classical cosmological…
We point out some of the outstanding challenges for embedding inflationary cosmology within string theory studying the process of reheating for models where the inflaton is a closed string mode parameterising the size of an internal cycle…
We show how short inflation naturally arises in a non-minimal gravity theory with a scalar field without any potential terms. This field drives inflation solely by its derivatives, which couple to the matter only through the combination…
In this lecture I will review the present status of inflation within string-based brane-world scenarios. The idea is to start from a supersymmetric configuration with two parallel static Dp-branes, and slightly break the supersymmetry…
A new shifted hybrid inflationary scenario is introduced which, in contrast to the older one, relies only on renormalizable superpotential terms. This scenario is automatically realized in a concrete extension of the "minimal"…
Supersymmetric Unified theories which incorporate a renormalizable Type I seesaw mechanism for small neutrino masses can also provide slow roll inflection point inflation along a flat direction associated with a gauge invariant combination…
The inflation model with non-minimal coupling scalar field in the context of the hybrid metric Palatini is studied in this paper. We derive the Einstein's field equations, the equations of motion of the scalar field. Furthermore,the…
The simplest two-field completion of natural inflation has a regime in which both fields are active and in which its predictions are within the Planck 1-$\sigma$ confidence contour. We show this for the original model of natural inflation,…