Related papers: Aligned Natural Inflation in the Large Volume Scen…
We perform the complete stability study of the model of chromo-natural inflation (Adshead and Wyman '12), where, due to its coupling to a SU(2) vector, a pseudo-scalar inflaton chi slowly rolls on a steep potential. As a typical example,…
The slow-roll inflation is a beautiful paradigm, yet the inflaton potential can hardly be sufficiently flat when unknown gravitational effects are taken into account. However, the hybrid inflation models constructed in D = 4 N = 1…
In this paper we obtain a model of Natural Inflation from string theory with a Planckian decay constant. We investigate D-brane dynamics in the background of the warped resolved conifold (WRC) throat approximation of Type IIB string…
In cosmological models where local cosmic strings are formed at the end of a period of inflation, the perturbations are seeded both by the defects and by the quantum fluctuations. In a subset of these models, for example those based on…
We study a model of accidental inflation in type IIB string theory where inflation occurs near the inflection point of a small K\"ahler modulus. A racetrack structure helps to alleviate the known concern that string-loop corrections may…
Large field inflation can be sensitive to perturbative and nonperturbative quantum corrections that spoil slow roll. A large number $N$ of light species in the theory, which occur in many string constructions, can amplify these problems.…
Multi-natural inflation is studied in the context of warm inflation. We study the warm multi-natural inflation scenario with both linear and cubic temperature-dependent dissipation coefficients. The model is motivated by axion-like…
The weak gravity conjecture imposes severe constraints on natural inflation. A trans-Planckian axion decay constant can only be realized if the potential exhibits an additional (subdominant) modulation with sub-Planckian periodicity. The…
We study the cosmological properties of a metastable de Sitter vacuum obtained recently in the framework of type IIB flux compactifications in the presence of three D7-brane stacks, based on perturbative quantum corrections at both…
We study an inflationary model developed by Kaloper and Sorbo, in which the inflaton is an axion with a sub-Planckian decay constant, whose potential is generated by mixing with a topological 4-form field strength. This gives a 4d…
The M-theory, the strong-coupling heterotic string theory, presents various interesting new phenomenologies. The M-theory bulk axion is one of these. The decay constant in this context is estimated as $F_a\simeq 10^{16}$ GeV. Direct…
We study an extension of the natural inflation model comprising a non-Abelian gauge sector coupled to the axion-inflaton kinetic term. We show how such non-minimal coupling serves as a source of friction for the rolling inflaton granting…
The inflationary paradigm has enjoyed phenomenological success, however, a compelling particle physics realization is still lacking. The key obstruction is that the requirement of a suitably flat scalar potential is sensitive to…
Dilaton and axion are ubiquitous in extended supergravities and closed superstrings. We propose new models of modular inflation in four-dimensional $N=1$ supergravity coupled to the chiral dilaton-axion-goldstino supermultiplet, which fit…
Successful inflationary models should (i) describe the data well; (ii) arise generically from sensible UV completions; (iii) be insensitive to detailed fine-tunings of parameters and (iv) make interesting new predictions. We argue that a…
We develop sequestered inflation models, where inflation occurs along flat directions in supergravity models derived from type IIB string theory. It is compactified on a ${\mathbb{T}^6 \over \mathbb{Z}_2 \times \mathbb{Z}_2}$ orientifold…
In axion gauge field inflation an axion-like particle driving cosmic inflation is coupled to the Chern-Simons density of an Abelian or non-Abelian gauge group. In the case of a non-Abelian gauge group, this can lead to the formation of a…
We construct a no-scale model of inflation with a single modulus whose real and imaginary parts are fixed by simple power-law corrections to the no-scale K{\" a}hler potential. Assuming an uplift of the minimum of the effective potential,…
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…
We study the system of axion strings that forms in the early Universe if the Peccei-Quinn symmetry is restored after inflation. Using numerical simulations, we establish the existence of an asymptotic solution to which the system is…