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The combination of non-minimal couplings to gravity with the post-inflationary kinetic-dominated era typically appearing in quintessential inflation scenarios may lead to the spontaneous symmetry breaking of internal symmetries and its…
We show that a detectable tensor-to-scalar ratio $(r\ge 10^{-3})$ on the CMB scale can be generated even during extremely low energy inflation which saturates the BBN bound $\rho_{\rm inf}\approx (30 {\rm MeV})^4$. The source of the…
When cosmic strings are formed during inflation, they regrow to reach a scaling regime, leaving distinct imprints on the stochastic gravitational wave background (SGWB). Such signatures, associated with specific primordial features, can be…
Primordial gravitational waves are a crucial prediction of inflation theory, and their detection through their imprints on the cosmic microwave background is actively being pursued. However, these attempts have not yet been successful. In…
Assuming that the early universe had (i) a description using perturbative string theory and its field theory limit (ii) an epoch of slow-roll inflation within a four-dimensional effective field theory and a hierarchy of scales $M_{inf} <…
Pre--big bang models of inflation based on string cosmology produce a stochastic gravitational wave background whose spectrum grows with decreasing wavelength, and which may be detectable using interferometers such as LIGO. We point out…
Recent observations by pulsar timing arrays (PTAs) indicate a potential detection of a stochastic gravitational wave (GW) background. Metastable cosmic strings have been recognized as a possible source of the observed signals. In this…
A class of well-motivated models of inflation end by producing cosmic strings. The current status of efforts to calculate and observe the signals from such models are outlined, with a particular emphasis on cosmic strings, and on the Cosmic…
In the present work we discuss cosmic strings in natural inflation. Our analysis is based entirely on the CMB quadrupole temperature anisotropy and on the existing upper bound on the cosmic string tension. Our results show that the allowed…
We investigate the sources of the Hubble-induced mass for a flat direction in supersymmetric theories and show that the sign of the Hubble-induced mass generally changes just after the end of inflation. This implies that global cosmic…
The detection of primordial gravitational waves, or tensor perturbations, would be regarded as compelling evidence for inflation. The canonical measure of this is the ratio of tensor to scalar perturbations, r. For single-field slow-roll…
We construct a hybrid-inflation model where the inflaton potential is generated radiatively, as gauge symmetries guarantee it to be accidentally flat at tree level. The model can be regarded as a small-field version of Natural Inflation,…
Supersolid inflation is a class of inflationary theories that simultaneously breaks time and space reparameterization invariance during inflation, with distinctive features for the dynamics of cosmological fluctuations. We investigate…
Inflation generates gravitational waves, which may be observable in the low multipoles of the cosmic microwave background (cmb) anisotropy but only if the inflaton field variation is at least of order the Planck scale. Such a large…
According to the famous Lyth bound, one can confirm large field inflation by finding tensor modes with sufficiently large tensor-to-scalar ratio $r$. Here we will try to answer two related questions: Is it possible to rule out all large…
It is sometimes argued that observation of tensor modes from inflation would provide the first evidence for quantum gravity. However, in the usual inflationary formalism, also the scalar modes involve quantised metric perturbations. We…
We point out that detectable inflationary tensor modes can be generated by particle or string sources produced during inflation, consistently with the requirements for inflation and constraints from scalar fluctuations. We show via examples…
Gravitational waves from cosmic strings are generated in the first fractions of a second after the Big Bang, potentially providing a unprecedented probe of the early universe. We discuss the key dynamical processes underlying calculations…
We discuss how in $SO(10)$ grand unification an observable number density of topologically stable intermediate mass ( $\sim 10^{14}$ GeV) monopoles survive inflation driven by a Coleman-Weinberg potential and non-minimal coupling of the…
In effective supergravity theories following from the superstring, a modulus field can quite naturally set the neccessary initial conditions for successful cosmological inflation to be driven by a hidden sector scalar field. The leading…