Related papers: A Simple Model of Large Scale Structure Formation
We consider single field chaotic inflationary models plus a cosine modulation term, as in axion monodromy models, and augment it by a light scalar field with similar cosine coupling. We show the power spectrum of curvature perturbations of…
Recent tentative findings of non-Gaussian structure in the COBE-DMR dataset have triggered renewed attention to candidate models from which such intrinsic signature could arise. In the framework of slow roll inflation with built-in non…
If a sizeable tensor-to-scalar ratio ~0.1 turns out to be detected and a negative running of the scalar spectral index ~0.01 is significantly required by the data, the vast majority of single field models of inflation will be ruled out. We…
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…
Could COBE DMR be detecting the imprint from a spectrum of gravitational waves generated during inflation? The conventional inflationary prediction had been that the cosmic microwave anisotropy is dominated by energy density fluctuations…
The determination of the inflationary energy scale represents one of the first step towards the understanding of the early Universe physics. The (very mild) non-Gaussian signals that arise from any inflation model carry information about…
We consider an inflationary model motivated by quantum effects of gravitational and matter fields near the Planck scale. Our Lagrangian is a re-summed version of the effective Lagrangian recently obtained by Demmel, Saueressig and…
It is tempting to inflate along one of the many flat directions that arise in supersymmetric theories. The required flatness of the potential to obtain sufficient inflation and to not overproduce density fluctuations occurs naturally.…
We consider the well motivated model of the (standard) supersymmetric F-term hybrid inflation (FHI) which can be realized close to the grand unification scale. The predicted scalar spectral index $n_s$ cannot be smaller than 0.98 and can…
We investigate the possibility that a heavy scalar field, whose mass exceeds the Hubble scale during inflation, could leave non-negligible signatures in the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) temperature anisotropy power spectrum through the…
Forthcoming missions probing the absolute intensity of the CMB are expected to be able to measure spectral distortions, which are deviations from its blackbody distribution. As cosmic inflation can induce spectral distortions, these…
Recent developments in inflation model building, based on supersymmetry, have produced compelling models in which strings are produced at the end of inflation. In such models the cosmological perturbations are seeded both by the defects and…
Models of supersymmetric D-term inflation require a new mass scale near 10^{15-16} GeV in order to match the density perturbation spectrum observed by COBE. Attempts to obtain such a scale from the anomalous U(1) of string theories fail in…
We reconsider the predictions of inflation for the spectral index of scalar (energy density) fluctuations (n_s) and the tensor/scalar ratio (r) using a discrete, model-independent measure of the degree of fine-tuning required to obtain a…
This is a review of particle-theory models of inflation, and of their predictions for the primordial density perturbation that is thought to be the origin of structure in the Universe. It contains mini-reviews of the relevant observational…
Attempts at building an unified description of the strong, weak and electromagnetic interactions usually involve several stages of spontaneous symmetry breaking. We consider the effects of such symmetry breaking during an era of primordial…
Within supersymmetry we provide an example where the inflaton sector is derived from a gauge invariant polynomial of SU(N) or SO(N) gauge theory. Inflation in our model is driven by multi-flat directions, which assist accelerated expansion.…
The standard calculation of the spectrum of density perturbations produced during inflation assumes (i) |n-1| << 1 and (ii) |dn/dlnk| << |n-1|. Slow-roll predicts and observations require (i), but neither slow-roll nor observations require…
We revisit the framework of axion-like inflation in view of the possibility that the coupling of the inflaton to a non-Abelian topological charge density could lead to the generation of a rapidly thermalizing heat bath. Both dispersive…
The inflation-inspired flat, cold dark matter-dominated models of structure formation with adiabatic, nearly scale-invariant initial conditions agree very well with current CMB anisotropy data. The success of these models is highlighted by…