Related papers: "Graceful" Old Inflation
We draw attention to the possibility that inflation (i.e. accelerated expansion) might continue after the end of slow roll, during a period of fast oscillations of the inflaton field \phi . This phenomenon takes place when a mild…
In double-field inflation, which exploits two scalar fields, one of the fields rolls slowly during inflation whereas the other field is trapped in a meta-stable vacuum. The nucleation rate from the false vacuum to the true one becomes…
A new class of inflationary attractors characterized by a strongly non-geodesic motion has been discovered and explored in the past few years. I describe how they naturally arise in negatively curved field space, allowing to inflate on…
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…
We revisit models of natural inflation and show that the single-field effective theory described by the potential $V(a)\sim \cos\frac{a}{f}$ breaks down as the inflaton $a$ makes large-field excursions, even for values of $f$ smaller than…
In this short note we discuss the possibility of producing a slow rolling inflationary background by considering a massive scalar field whose kinetic term is non-minimally coupled to gravity.
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…
Affine gravity, a gravity theory based on affine connection with no notion of metric, supports scalar field dynamics only if scalar fields have non-vanishing potential. The non-vanishing vacuum energy ensures that the cosmological constant…
I give a general formulation of the constraints on models of inflation ended by a first order phase transition arising from the requirement that they do not produce too many large (observable) true vacuum voids -- the `big bubble problem'.…
We propose a scenario where inflation is driven by non-minimally coupled massive vector fields. In an isotropic homogeneous universe these fields behave in presicely the same way as a massive minimally coupled scalar field. Therefore our…
An alternative inflationary model is proposed predicated upon a consideration of the form of the uncertainty principle in a curved background spacetime. An argument is presented suggesting a possible curvature dependence in the correct…
We propose a model for cosmic inflation which is based on an effective description of strongly interacting, nonsupersymmetric matter within the framework of dynamical Abelian projection and centerization. The underlying gauge symmetry is…
We examine a scalar-tensor model of gravity that is globally scale-invariant. When adapted to a spatially flat Robertson-Walker metric, the equations of motion describe a dynamical system that flows from an unstable de Sitter space to a…
We make use of possible high energy correction to the Friedmann equation to implement the bounce and study the behavior of massive scalar field before and after bounce semianalytically and numerically. We find that the slow-roll inflation…
Non-singular bouncing cosmologies are well--motivated models for the early universe. Recent observational data are consistent with positive spatial curvature and allow for a natural collapsing and bouncing phase in the very early universe.…
We assess two potential signals of the formation of our universe by the decay of a false vacuum. Negative spatial curvature is one possibility, but the window for its detection is now small. However, another possible signal is a suppression…
A Multiverse can arise from landscapes without de Sitter minima. It can be populated during a period of eternal inflation without trans-Planckian field excursions and without flat potentials. This Multiverse can explain the values of the…
We consider a k-essence model in which a single scalar field can be responsible for both primordial inflation and the present observed acceleration of the cosmological background geometry, while also admitting a nonsingular de Sitter…
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 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…