Related papers: Massive-ish Particles from Small-ish Scales: Non-P…
Searches for primordial non-Gaussianity (NG) has the potential to not only reveal the physics of cosmic inflation, but also the structure of fundamental interactions at the highest energies. The cosmological collider (CC) physics program…
Current bounds on the tensor-to-scalar ratio imply that the energy scale of inflation may lie below the grand-unified scale. In this paper, we show that in a broad class of single-field inflation models with sufficiently small energy…
In this work we analyse in detail the possibility of using small and intermediate-scale gravitational wave anisotropies to constrain the inflationary particle content. First, we develop a phenomenological approach focusing on anisotropies…
Particle production processes in the expanding universe are described within a simple kinetic model. The equilibrium conditions for a Maxwell-Boltzmann gas with variable particle number are investigated. We find that radiation and…
After cosmic inflation and before the transition to radiation domination, the cosmic energy density may have been dominated during an extended period by an oscillating massive scalar condensate. We show that during this period, sub-Hubble…
We calculate power spectra of cosmological perturbations at high accuracy for two classes of inflation models. We classify the models according to the behaviour of the Hubble distance during inflation. Our approximation works if the Hubble…
Interactions between the inflaton and any additional fields can lead to isolated bursts of particle production during inflation (for example from parametric resonance or a phase transition). Inflationary particle production leaves localized…
We study effects of multiple scalar fields (scalar isocurvatons) with the Hubble scale masses on the inflationary bispectrum in the squeezed limit, particular paying attention to the question how to disentangle mass spectra of such fields.…
We study the effect of quantum decoherence on the inflationary cosmological perturbations. This process might imprint specific observational signatures revealing the quantum nature of the inflationary mechanism being related to the…
The motion of a pseudo-scalar field $X$ during inflation naturally induces a significant amplification of the gauge fields to which it is coupled. The amplified gauge fields can source characteristic scalar and tensor primordial…
The discovery of gravitational waves from merging binary black holes has generated considerable interest in examining whether these black holes could have a primordial origin. If a significant number of black holes have to be produced in…
We present the first computation of the cosmological perturbations generated during inflation up to second order in deviations from the homogeneous background solution. Our results, which fully account for the inflaton self-interactions as…
We apply the squeezed state formalism to scalar field dark matter (e.g. axion) perturbations generated during inflation. As for the inflationary perturbations, the scalar field state becomes highly squeezed as modes exit the horizon. For as…
In this letter, we propose a model of inflationary cosmology with a bounce preceded and study its primordial curvature perturbations. Our model gives rise to a primordial power spectrum with a feature of oscillation on large scales compared…
In standard inflationary cosmology, scalar and tensor perturbations grew as the Universe expanded and froze when their wavelengths exceeded the Hubble horizon, producing a tell-tale signature in the fluctuation spectrum and amplitude of the…
We analyze cosmological particle production driven by spacetime expansion in the early universe for homogeneous and isotropic cosmologies with positive, negative, and zero spatial curvature. We prioritize analytical results to gain a deeper…
Supersymmetry plays a fundamental role in the radiative stability of many inflationary models. Spontaneous breaking of the symmetry inevitably leads to fields with masses of order the Hubble scale during inflation. When these fields couple…
Cosmic inflation, a period of accelerated expansion in the early universe, can give rise to large amplitude ultra-large scale inhomogeneities on distance scales comparable to or larger than the observable universe. The cosmic microwave…
Is there new physics hidden in the four-point function of the cosmic microwave background (CMB)? We conduct a detailed analysis of the Planck PR4 temperature and polarization trispectrum for $\ell\in[2,2048]$. Using the theoretical and…
We study the non-Gaussianities generated by light axions, or compact scalar fields, during inflation. To correctly calculate their impact on primordial statistics, we will argue that it is necessary to account for the periodicity, or gauge…