English

On second-order superhorizon perturbations in multifield inflationary models

Astrophysics 2008-11-26 v4 General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology

Abstract

We present a method for the study of second-order superhorizon perturbations in multi field inflationary models with non trivial kinetic terms. We utilise a change of coordinates in field space to separate isocurvature and adiabatic perturbations generalizing previous results. We also construct second order gauge invariant variables related to them. It is found that with an arbitrary metric in field space the isocurvature perturbation sources the gravitational potential on long wavelengths even for ``straight'' trajectories. The potential decouples from the isocurvature perturbations if the background fields' trajectory is a geodesic in field space. Taking nonlinear effects into account shows that, in general, the two types of perturbations couple to each other. This is an outline of a possible procedure to study nonlinear and non-Gaussian effects during multifield inflation.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.astro-ph/0212141,
  title  = {On second-order superhorizon perturbations in multifield inflationary models},
  author = {Gerasimos Rigopoulos},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:astro-ph/0212141},
  year   = {2008}
}

Comments

19 pages, 1 figure; Substantial revision from earlier versions. Published in Classical and Quantum Gravity

R2 v1 2026-07-22T08:18:00.642Z