Related papers: Signals of Inflation in a Friendly String Landscap…
Inflation may have been driven by a component which violated the Null-Energy Condition, thereby leading to {\it super inflation}. We provide the formalism to study cosmological perturbations when such a component is described by a scalar…
We carry out a comprehensive analysis of the simplest curvaton model, which is based on two non-interacting massive fields. Our analysis encompasses cases where the inflaton and curvaton both contribute to observable perturbations, and…
We present an overview of inflationary models derived from string theory focusing mostly on closed string moduli as inflatons. After a detailed discussion of the eta-problem and different approaches to address it, we describe possible ways…
A perturbative strategy for inflation described by two-inflaton fields is developed using a mathematical analogy with the renormalization-group. Two small quantities, $\alpha$ and $\lambda$, corresponding to standard slow-roll parameters…
Several models of inflation employing a triplet of SU(2) vectors with spatially orthogonal vacuum expectation values (VEVs) have been recently proposed. One (tensor) combination $t$ of the vector modes is amplified in some momentum range…
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 review the main aspects of the warm inflation scenario, focusing on the inflationary dynamics and the predictions related to the primordial spectrum of perturbations, to be compared with the recent cosmological observations. We study in…
We attempt an estimate for the distribution of the tensor mode fraction $r$ over the landscape of vacua in string theory. The dynamics of eternal inflation and quantum tunneling lead to a kind of democracy on the landscape, providing no…
We present a new mechanism for slow-roll inflation based on higher dimensional supersymmetric gauge theory compactified to four dimensions with twisted (supersymmetry breaking) boundary conditions. These boundary conditions lead to a…
String theory enjoys an elevated role among quantum gravity theories, since it seems to be the most consistent UV completion of general relativity and the Standard Model. However, it is hard to verify the existence of this underlying theory…
String theory models of axion monodromy inflation exhibit scalar potentials which are quadratic for small values of the inflaton field and evolve to a more complicated function for large field values. Oftentimes the large field behaviour is…
We study the spectral index of curvature perturbations for inflationary models where the driving scalar field is coupled to a relativistic fluid through a friction term $\Gamma$. We find that only a very small friction term - $\Gamma \ll…
In the framework of effective field theories with prominent helicity-0 and helicity-1 fields coupled to each other via a dimension-3 operator, we study the dynamics of inflation driven by the helicity-0 mode, with a given potential energy,…
We revisit two-field hybrid inflation as an effective field theory for low-scale inflation with sub-Planckian scalar field ranges. We focus on a prototype model by Stewart because it allows for a red spectral tilt, which still fits the…
Minimal hybrid inflation in supergravity has been ruled out by the 2015 Planck observations because the spectral index of the produced curvature perturbation falls outside observational bounds. To resurrect the model, a number of…
In the framework of a flat FLRW model we derive an inflationary regime in which the scalar field, laying on the plateau of its potential, admits a linear time dependence and remains close to a constant value. The behaviour of inhomogeneous…
We present a mechanism for realizing hybrid inflation using two axion fields with a purely non-perturbatively generated scalar potential. The structure of scalar potential is highly constrained by the discrete shift symmetries of the…
We extend a recently proposed framework, dubbed inflation by supersymmetry breaking, to hybrid inflation by introducing a waterfall field that allows to decouple the supersymmetry breaking scale in the observable sector from the inflation…
The presence of multiple fields during inflation might seed a detectable amount of non-Gaussianity in the curvature perturbations, which in turn becomes observable in present data sets like the cosmic microwave background (CMB) or the large…
We propose a new realization of the chaotic inflationary scenario in which the scalar field responsible for inflation also spontaneously breaks the underlying gauge symmetry at a superheavy scale $\sim 10^{15} - 10^{17}\; GeV$. A possible…