Related papers: On compatibility of string effective action with a…
We derive the first quantum gravitational corrections to the inflationary power spectra for a general single-field scalar-tensor theory which includes a non-minimal coupling to gravity, a non-standard scalar kinetic term and an arbitrary…
At the level of heuristic effective dynamics, we investigate the cosmological inflation with holonomy corrections of loop quantum cosmology (LQC) in the $k=0$ Friedmann-Robertson-Walker model with a single inflaton field subject to a simple…
We show that a pair of field theory monodromies in which the shift symmetry is broken by small, well motivated deformations, naturally incorporates a mechanism for cancelling off radiative corrections to the cosmological constant. The…
We study the inflationary gravitational wave background induced by Abelian gauge fields generated by non-minimal kinetic and axial couplings to the inflaton. We show that, up to slow-roll corrections, for coupling functions that share the…
In this paper we investigate the inflationary phenomenology of an Einstein-Gauss-Bonnet theory with the extension of a logarithmic modified $f(R)$ gravity, compatible with the GW170817 event. The main idea of our work is to study different…
We show that cosmic acceleration can arise due to very tiny corrections to the usual gravitational action of General Relativity of the form $R^n$, with $n<0$. This eliminates the need for dark energy, though it does not address the…
We present a simple toy model corresponding to a network of frustrated topological defects of domain walls or cosmic strings that exist previous to the standard slow-roll inflationary era of the universe. Such a network (i) can produce a…
This thesis is dedicated to the study of inflationary scenarios based on string theory. Inflation is a brief period of accelerated expansion in the very early Universe which gives natural explanations for problems of the Standard Big Bang…
We show how two simple modifications to the standard cosmic string scenario for structure formation compare to the recently released Boomerang data set. Namely we consider pure string closed models and mixed models where both inflation and…
We study the scalar sector of the Two Measures Field Theory (TMT) model in the context of cosmological dynamics. The scalar sector includes the inflaton \phi and the Higgs \upsilon fields. The model possesses gauge and scale invariance. The…
A gravity-anti-gravity (GaG) odd linear dilaton action offers an eternal inflation evolution governed by the unified (cosmological constant plus radiation) equation of state $\rho-3P=4\Lambda$. At the mini superspace level, a 'two-particle'…
High-scale string inflationary models are in well-known tension with low-energy supersymmetry. A promising solution involves models where the inflaton is the volume of the extra dimensions so that the gravitino mass relaxes from large…
Models which accelerate the expansion of the universe through the addition of a function of the Ricci scalar f(R) leave a characteristic signature in the large-scale structure of the universe at the Compton wavelength scale of the extra…
We study a generality of an inflationary scenario by integrating the Einstein equations numerically in a plane-symmetric spacetime. We consider the inhomogeneous spacetimes due to (i) localized gravitational waves with a positive…
Cosmic acceleration is widely believed to require either a source of negative pressure (i.e., dark energy), or a modification of gravity, which necessarily implies new degrees of freedom beyond those of Einstein gravity. In this paper we…
Conformal embedding of closed-universe models in a de Sitter background suggests a quantisation condition on the available conformal time. This condition implies that the universe is closed at no greater than the 10% level. When a massive…
We consider slow-roll inflation for a single scalar field with an arbitrary potential and an arbitrary nonminimal coupling to the Gauss-Bonnet term. By introducing a combined hierarchy of Hubble and Gauss-Bonnet flow functions, we…
We study inflation and late-time acceleration in the expansion of the universe in non-minimal electromagnetism, in which the electromagnetic field couples to the scalar curvature function. It is shown that power-law inflation can be…
A recent proposal for gauge-invariant observables in inflation [R. Brunetti et al., JHEP 1608 (2016) 032] is examined. We give a generalisation of their construction to general background spacetimes. In flat space, we calculate one-loop…
We study models of modular inflation of the form expected to arise from low energy effective actions of superstring theories. We argue on general grounds that the most likely models of modular slow-roll inflation are small field models in…