Related papers: Stochastic approach to gravitational waves from in…
In the framework of Born-Infeld inspired gravity theories, which deviates from General Relativity (GR) in the high curvature regime, we discuss the viability of Cosmic Inflation without scalar fields. For energy densities higher than the…
We consider cosmological inflation generated by a scalar field slowly rolling off from a de Sitter maximum of its potential. The models belong to the class of hilltop models and represent the most general model of this kind in which the…
In arXiv:0908.4089, we have proposed a model where natural inflation is realized on a steep potential as a consequence of the interaction of the inflaton with gauge fields through an axion-like coupling. In the present work we study the…
Inflationary cosmology proposes that the early Universe undergoes accelerated expansion, driven, in simple scenarios, by a single scalar field, or inflaton. The form of the inflaton potential determines the initial spectra of density…
We consider the production of gravitons in an inflationary cosmology by approximating each epoch of change in the equation of state as sudden, from which a simple analytic graviton mode function has been derived. We use this mode function…
Using techniques from loop quantum gravity, the standard theory of cosmological perturbations was recently generalized to encompass the Planck era. We now apply this framework to explore pre-inflationary dynamics. The framework enables us…
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…
Stochastic inflation is an effective theory describing the super-Hubble, coarse-grained, scalar fields driving inflation, by a set of Langevin equations. We previously highlighted the difficulty of deriving a theory of stochastic inflation…
A long-standing problem in primordial cosmology is to understand the precise relation between the stochastic formalism and standard perturbation theory for light scalar fields in inflationary spacetimes. A complete correspondence between…
We discuss the inflaton $\phi$ in an environment of scalar fields $\chi_{n}$ on flat and curved manifolds. We average over the environmental fields $\chi_{n}$. We study a contribution of superhorizon $k<<aH$ as well as subhorizon $k>> aH$…
We study the Brownian motion of a field where there are boundaries in the inflationary field space. Both the field and the boundary undergo Brownian motions with the amplitudes of the noises determined by the Hubble expansion rate of the…
We consider the 3-pt function (i.e. the bispectrum or non-Gaussianity) for stochastic backgrounds of gravitational waves. We estimate the amplitude of this signal for the primordial inflationary background, gravitational waves generated…
The curvaton scenario for the generation of the cosmological curvature perturbation on large scales represents an alternative to the standard slow-roll scenario of inflation in which the observed density perturbations are due to…
Physical scenarios, leading to highly energetic stochastic gravitational waves backgrounds (for frequencies ranging from the $\mu$Hz up to the GHz) are examined. In some cases the typical amplitude of the logarithmic energy spectrum can be…
In order to go beyond the mean-field approximation, commonly used in the inflationary computations, an identification of the quantum constituents of the inflationary background is made. In particular, the homogeneous scalar field…
We employ multiple-scale analysis to systematically derive analytical approximations describing the cosmological propagation of gravitational waves beyond general relativity, in a framework with two interacting spin-2 fields with…
A field kinetic coupling with the Einstein tensor leads to a gravitationally enhanced friction during inflation, by which even steep potentials with theoretically natural model parameters can drive cosmic acceleration. In the presence of…
This thesis is dedicated to studying cosmological inflation, which is a period of accelerated expansion in the very early Universe that is required to explain the observed anisotropies in the cosmic microwave background. Inflation, when…
A cosmological gravitational wave background resulting from space-time quantum perturbations at energy scales of $\sim 10^{15}$GeV is expected as a consequence of the general relativity theory in the context of the standard cosmological…
Stochastic inflation can resolve strong inflationary perturbations, which seed primordial black holes. I present a fast and accurate way to compute these perturbations in typical black hole producing single-field models, treating the…