Related papers: Scalar condensate decay in a fermionic heat bath i…
We study the damping of an oscillating scalar field in a Friedmann-Robertson-Walker spacetime by perturbative processes, taking into account the finite density effects that interactions with the plasma of decay products have on the damping…
We calculate the relaxation rate of a scalar field in a plasma of other scalars and fermions with gauge interactions using thermal quantum field theory. It yields the rate of cosmic reheating and thereby determines the temperature of the…
We present a study of the decay of metastable states of a scalar field via thermal activation, in the presence of a finite density of fermions. The process we consider is the nucleation of ``{\it droplets}'' of true vacuum inside the false…
We consider the case of a scalar field, the inflaton, coupled to both lighter scalars and fermions, and the study the relaxation of the inflaton via particle production in both the linear and non-linear regimes. This has an immediate…
In this paper, we discuss the constraints on the reheating temperature supposing an early post-reheating cosmological phase dominated by one or more simple scalar fields produced from inflaton decay and decoupled from matter and radiation.…
We calculate the dissipation rate of a coherently oscillating scalar field in a thermal environment using nonequilibrium quantum field theory and apply it to the reheating stage after cosmic inflation. It is shown that the rate is…
I study the post-inflation oscillation and decay of light coherent scalar field condensates that may develop during an inflationary phase of the universe. In particular, the light scalars studied are a composition of the scalar particles of…
We consider the non-equilibrium evolution of the inflaton field coupled to both lighter scalars and fermions. The dissipational dynamics of this field is studied and found to be quite different than that believed in inflationary models. In…
We investigate the thermalization process of the Universe after inflation to determine the evolution of the effective temperature. The time scale of thermalization is found to be so long that it delays the evolution of the effective…
We provide a detailed study of reheating in the kination regime in a scenario where the particle content is produced by gravitational production of massive scalars decaying into massless scalars and fermions which eventually reheat the…
The time dependence of the temperature during the reheating process is studied. We consider the thermal feedback effects of the produced particles on the effective dissipation rate of the inflaton field, which can lead to enhanced…
The motion of a scalar field that interacts with a hot plasma, like the inflaton during reheating, is damped, which is a dissipative process. At high temperatures the damping can be described by a local term in the effective equation of…
The reheating process for the inflationary scenario is investigated phenomenologically. The decay of the oscillating massive inflaton field into light bosons is modeled after an out of equilibrium mixture of interacting fluids within the…
Thermal field theory is applied to particle production rates in inflationary models, leading to new results for catalysed, or two-stage decay, where massive fields act as decay channels for the production of light fields. A numerical…
In generic particle physics models, the inflaton field is coupled to other bosonic and fermionic fields that acquire large masses during inflation and may decay into light degrees of freedom. This leads to dissipative effects that modify…
The inflaton must convert its energy into radiation after inflation, which, in a conventional scenario, is caused by the perturbative inflaton decay. This reheating process would be much more complicated in some cases: the decay products…
We analyze in detail the perturbative decay of the inflaton oscillating about a generic form of its potential $V(\phi) = \phi^k$, taking into account the effects of non-instantaneous reheating. We show that evolution of the temperature as a…
Inflation has long been the accepted paradigm for understanding the early universe. Most models of inflation have a scalar field acting as the inflaton particle which decays after inflation during a process called reheating into standard…
We study the thermodynamic behavior of a decaying scalar field coupled to a relativistic simple fluid. It is shown that if the decay products are represented by a thermalized bath, its temperature evolution law requires naturally a new…
We study the problem of scalar particle production after inflation by a rapidly oscillating inflaton field. We use the framework of the chaotic inflation scenario with quartic and quadratic inflaton potentials. Particular attention is paid…