Related papers: The quantum gravity connection between inflation a…
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…
The inflationary and pre-inflationary evolution of scalar modes of cosmological perturbations in a closed universe is analyzed for a loop quantum cosmology model with an inflationary regime consistent with the constraints on inflation…
Quantum gravity may shed light on the prehistory of the universe. Quantum corrections to gravity affect the dynamics of the expansion of the universe. Their influence is studied on the example of the exactly solvable quantum model. The…
Cosmological models in 1+1 dimensions are an ideal setting for investigating the quantum structure of inflationary dynamics -- gravity is renormalizable, while there is room for spatial structure not present in the minisuperspace…
We propose a phenomenological approach to the cosmological constant problem based on generally covariant non-local and acausal modifications of four-dimensional gravity at enormous distances. The effective Newton constant becomes very small…
Inflation with tunneling from a false to a true vacuum becomes viable in the presence of a scalar field that slows down the initial de Sitter phase. As a by-product this field also sets dynamically the value of the Newton constant observed…
Loop quantum cosmology provides an efficient framework to study the evolution of the Universe beyond the classical Big Bang paradigm. Because of holonomy corrections, the singularity is replaced by a "bounce". The dynamics of the background…
Motivated by the gauge theory of gravity with local scaling symmetry proposed recently in 1712.04537 and 1506.01807, we investigate whether the scalar field therein can be responsible for the inflation. We show that the classical theory…
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…
A huge value of cosmological constant characteristic for the particle physics and the inflation of early Universe are inherently related to each other: one can construct a fine-tuned superpotential, which produces a flat potential of…
We investigate cosmological solutions for the modified gravity theory obtained from quantum relative entropy between the metric of spacetime and the metric induced by the geometry and matter fields. The vacuum equations admit inflationary…
Fundamental theories of quantum gravity such as supergravity include a four form field strength which contributes to the cosmological constant. The inclusion of such a field into our theory of open inflation (hep-th/9802030) allows an…
Inflationary cosmology has, in the last few years,received a strong dose of support from observations. The fact that the fluctuation spectrum can be extracted from the inflationary scenario through an analysis that involves quantum field…
This review article aims at presenting the theory of inflation. We first describe the background spacetime behavior during the slow-roll phase and analyze how inflation ends and the Universe reheats. Then, we present the theory of…
Quantum geometry predicts that a universe evolves through an inflationary phase at small volume before exiting gracefully into a standard Friedmann phase. This does not require the introduction of additional matter fields with ad hoc…
Attention has been recently drawn towards models in which inflation and quintessence schemes are unified. In such `quintessential inflation' models, a unique scalar field is required to play both the role of the inflaton and of the…
We show how, by considering the cumulative effect of tiny quantum gravitational fluctuations over very large distances, it may be possible to: ($a$) reconcile nucleosynthesis bounds on the density parameter of the Universe with the…
An accelerated universe should naturally have a vacuum energy density determined by its dynamical curvature. The cosmological constant is most likely a temporary description of a dynamical variable that has been drastically evolving from…
The linear cosmological perturbation theory of almost homogeneous and isotropic perfect fluid and scalar field universes is reconsidered and formally simplified. Using the existence of a covariant conserved quantity on large perturbation…
A special class of conformal gravity theories is proposed to solve the long standing problem of the fine-tuned cosmological constant. In the proposed model time evolution of the inflaton field leaves behind a nearly vanishing, but finite…