Gravity Waves and Linear Inflation from Axion Monodromy
Abstract
Wrapped branes in string compactifications introduce a monodromy that extends the field range of individual closed-string axions to beyond the Planck scale. Furthermore, approximate shift symmetries of the system naturally control corrections to the axion potential. This suggests a general mechanism for chaotic inflation driven by monodromy-extended closed-string axions. We systematically analyze this possibility and show that the mechanism is compatible with moduli stabilization and can be realized in many types of compactifications, including warped Calabi-Yau manifolds and more general Ricci-curved spaces. In this broad class of models, the potential is linear in the canonical inflaton field, predicting a tensor to scalar ratio r=0.07 accessible to upcoming cosmic microwave background (CMB) observations.
Cite
@article{arxiv.0808.0706,
title = {Gravity Waves and Linear Inflation from Axion Monodromy},
author = {Liam McAllister and Eva Silverstein and Alexander Westphal},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:0808.0706},
year = {2014}
}
Comments
pdfLaTeX, 40+1 pages, 4 figures