Related papers: Colliding Ghosts: Constraining Inflation with the …
In supergravity, the dynamics of the sgoldstino -- superpartner of the goldstino superfield associated with the breaking of supersymmetry at low energy -- can substantially modify the dynamics of inflation in the primordial Universe.…
Detection of parity violation on cosmological scales would have profound implications for fundamental physics. Motivated in part by recent measurements of parity-odd four-point correlation functions in BOSS and DESI luminous red galaxy…
A no-go theorem for parity-violation in even $D$-dimensional spacetimes invariant under $ISO(d)$ and dilatations (as well as the implications for odd $D$) is derived. For the case of real massless scalar and gravitons (as well as any…
The leading account of several salient observable features of our universe today is provided by the theory of cosmic inflation. But an important and thus far intractable question is whether inflation is generic, or whether it is finely…
We study models with several $SU(2)$ scalar doublets where the inert doublets have a non-minimal coupling to gravity and play the role of the inflaton. We allow for this coupling to be complex, thereby introducing CP-violation -- a…
Non-Gaussianities of the primordial density perturbations have emerged as a very powerful possible signal to test the dynamics that drove the period of inflation. While in general the most sensitive observable is the three-point function in…
New physics in the early Universe could lead to parity-violation in the late Universe, sourcing statistics whose sign changes under point reflection. The best constraints on such phenomena have come from the Planck temperature fluctuations;…
Using the dS/QFT correspondence in the context of inflation allows for the study of interesting, otherwise inaccessible physics. In particular, by studying inflation via its dual field theory at the boundary of the de Sitter space, it may…
We present a comprehensive study of galaxy intrinsic alignment (IA) as a probe of parity-violating primordial non-Gaussianity (PNG). Within the effective field theory (EFT) framework, we show that the parity-odd IA power spectrum is…
The string $\alpha^\prime$-correction to the usual Einstein action comprises a Gauss-Bonnet integrand multiplied by non-trivial functions of the modulus field $\chi$ and/or the dilaton field $\phi$. We discuss how the presence of such terms…
We study the multifield inflationary models where the cosmological perturbation is sourced by light scalar fields other than the inflaton. We exploit the operator product expansion and partly the symmetries present during the de Sitter…
Primordial non-Gaussianity generated by additional fields during inflation offers a compelling observational target. Heavy fields imprint characteristic oscillatory signals in non-Gaussian correlation functions of the inflaton, a process…
We show that the galaxy 4-Point Correlation Function (4PCF) can test for cosmological parity violation. The detection of cosmological parity violation would reflect previously unknown forces present at the earliest moments of the Universe.…
Models of cosmic inflation generically predict a weak but potentially detectable amount of primordial non-Gaussianity (PNG), which can be used to obtain insights into the degrees of freedom during inflation and their interactions. The…
Supersymmetry-based hybrid inflation models (referred to as `spontaneously broken supersymmetry' by the Planck collaboration) are attractive for several reasons, including the appealing feature that inflation is associated with local gauge…
We study a mechanism of generating the trispectrum (4-point correlation) of curvature perturbation through the dynamics of a spectator axion field and U(1) gauge field during inflation. Owing to the Chern-Simons coupling, only one helicity…
We generalize the Effective Field Theory of Inflation to include additional light scalar degrees of freedom that are in their vacuum at the time the modes of interest are crossing the horizon. In order to make the scalars light in a natural…
Ghost inflation is a well-known framework in which cosmological fluctuations can generate enhanced primordial non-Gaussianity, typically of the equilateral type. In its original form, however, it is in tension with current observational…
We examine the role of using symmetry and effective field theory in inflationary model building. We describe the standard formulation of starting with an approximate shift symmetry for a scalar field, and then introducing corrections…
A tetrahedron is the simplest shape that cannot be rotated into its mirror image in 3D. The 4-Point Correlation Function (4PCF), which quantifies excess clustering of quartets of galaxies over random, is the lowest-order statistic sensitive…