Related papers: Massive fields temper anomaly-induced inflation: t…
Quantum gravitational back-reaction offers the potential of simultaneously resolving the problem of the cosmological constant and providing a natural model of inflation in which scalars play no special role. In this model inflation begins…
In SuperCool Inflation (SCI), a technically natural and thermal effect gives a graceful exit to old inflation. The Universe starts off hot and trapped in a false vacuum. The Universe supercools and inflates solving the horizon and flatness…
A massless scalar field without self interaction and string coupled to gravity is quantized in the framework of quantum cosmology using the Bohm-de Broglie interpretation. Gaussian superpositions of the quantum solutions of the…
The anomaly-induced effective action is a useful tool for deriving the contributions coming from quantum effects of massless conformal fields. It is well-known that such corrections in the higher derivative vacuum sector of the…
We investigate how inflation can emerge from four-fermion interactions generated by spacetime torsion, eliminating the need for additional scalar fields beyond the Standard Model. We partition fermions in two sectors and introduce two bound…
We go a step further in the search for a consistent and realistic supergravity model of large-field inflation by building a class of models with the following features: during slow-roll, all the scalar fields other than the inflaton are…
We apply the effective field theory approach to quasi-single field inflation, which contains an additional scalar field with Hubble scale mass other than inflaton. Based on the time-dependent spatial diffeomorphism, which is not broken by…
This thesis is dedicated to studying cosmological inflation, which is a period of accelerated expansion in the very early Universe that is required to explain the observed anisotropies in the cosmic microwave background. Inflation, when…
We investigate the validity of effective field theory methods and the decoupling of heavy fields during inflation. Considering models of inflation in which the inflaton is coupled to a heavy (super-Hubble) degree of freedom initially in its…
We investigate the initiation of cosmic inflation, in full numerical relativity, from pre-inflationary scenarios with large tensor and vector fluctuations in the metric. These settings are characterized by having large values in the Weyl…
A scale-invariant universe can have a period of accelerated expansion at early times: inflation. We use a frame-invariant approach to calculate inflationary observables in a scale invariant theory of gravity involving two scalar fields -…
A model of inflation is proposed in which compact extra dimensions allow a graceful exit without recourse to flat potentials or super-Planckian field values. Though bubbles of true vacuum are too sparse to uniformly reheat the Universe by…
We show that quantum corrections to the effective potential in supersymmetric hybrid inflation can be calculated all the way from the inflationary period - when the Universe is dominated by a false vacuum energy density - till the fields…
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…
Quantum field theory, which is generally used to describe the origin of large-scale gravitational perturbations during cosmic inflation, has been shown to omit an important physical effect in curved space-time, the nonlocal entanglement…
Inflation models are numerous. It is extremely difficult, if possible at all, to identify the actual underlying inflation model of our primordial universe. Thus, for the purpose of proving/falsifying inflation and using inflation to probe…
Inflation in the early Universe is one of the most promising probes of gravity in the high-energy regime. However, observable scales give access to a limited window in the inflationary dynamics. In this essay, we argue that quantum…
We present an inflationary universe model which utilizes two coupled real scalar fields. The inflation field $\phi$ experiences a first order phase transition and its potential dominates the energy density of the Universe during the…
Cosmic Inflation provides an attractive framework for understanding the early universe and the cosmic microwave background. It can readily involve energies close to the scale at which Quantum Gravity effects become important. General…
A mechanism for suppressing the cosmological constant is developed, based on an analogy with a superconducting phaseshift in which free fermions coupled perturbatively to a weak gravitational field are in an unstable false vacuum state. The…