1,883 research outputs found
Inflationary preheating and primordial black holes
Preheating after inflation may over-produce primordial black holes (PBH's) in
many regions of parameter space. As an example we study two-field models with a
massless self-interacting inflaton, taking into account second order field and
metric backreaction effects as spatial averages. We find that a complex quilt
of parameter regions above the Gaussian PBH over-production threshold emerges
due to the enhancement of curvature perturbations on all scales. It should be
possible to constrain realistic models of inflation through PBH over-production
although many issues, such as rescattering and non-Gaussianity, remain unsolved
or unexplored.Comment: 7 pages, 6 figures. Fig 6 is added to show the weak dependence of the
mass variance on the initial conditio
Chaotic dynamics in preheating after inflation
We study chaotic dynamics in preheating after inflation in which an inflaton
is coupled to another scalar field through an interaction
. We first estimate the size of the quasi-homogeneous
field at the beginning of reheating for large-field inflaton potentials
by evaluating the amplitude of the fluctuations on
scales larger than the Hubble radius at the end of inflation. Parametric
excitations of the field during preheating can give rise to chaos
between two dynamical scalar fields. For the quartic potential (,
) chaos actually occurs for in a
linear regime before which the backreaction of created particles becomes
important. This analysis is supported by several different criteria for the
existence of chaos. For the quadratic potential () the signature of chaos
is not found by the time at which the backreaction begins to work, similar to
the case of the quartic potential with .Comment: 12 pages, 10 figures, Version to appear in Classical and Quantum
Gravit
Dynamics of assisted quintessence
We explore the dynamics of assisted quintessence, where more than one scalar field is present with the same potential. For potentials with tracking solutions, the fields naturally approach the same values—in the context of inflation this leads to the assisted inflation phenomenon where several fields can cooperate to drive a period of inflation though none is able to individually. For exponential potentials, we study the fixed points and their stability confirming results already in the literature, and then carry out a numerical analysis to show how assisted quintessence is realized. For inverse power-law potentials, we find by contrast that there is no assisted behavior—indeed those are the unique (monotonic) potentials where several fields together behave just as a single field in the same potential. More generally, we provide an algorithm for generating a single-field potential giving equivalent dynamics to multifield assisted quintessence
Cosmology of a covariant Galileon field
We study the cosmology of a covariant scalar field respecting a Galilean
symmetry in flat space-time. We show the existence of a tracker solution that
finally approaches a de Sitter fixed point responsible for cosmic acceleration
today. The viable region of model parameters is clarified by deriving
conditions under which ghosts and Laplacian instabilities of scalar and tensor
perturbations are absent. The field equation of state exhibits a peculiar
phantom-like behavior along the tracker, which allows a possibility to
observationally distinguish the Galileon gravity from the Lambda-CDM model.Comment: 4 pages, uses RevTe
Testing for double inflation with WMAP
With the WMAP data we can now begin to test realistic models of inflation
involving multiple scalar fields. These naturally lead to correlated adiabatic
and isocurvature (entropy) perturbations with a running spectral index. We
present the first full (9 parameter) likelihood analysis of double inflation
with WMAP data and find that despite the extra freedom, supersymmetric hybrid
potentials are strongly constrained with less than 7% correlated isocurvature
component allowed when standard priors are imposed on the cosomological
parameters. As a result we also find that Akaike & Bayesian model selection
criteria rather strongly prefer single-field inflation, just as equivalent
analysis prefers a cosmological constant over dynamical dark energy in the late
universe. It appears that simplicity is the best guide to our universe.Comment: 7 pages, 6 figure
Fermion production from preheating-amplified metric perturbations
We study gravitational creation of light fermions in the presence of
classical scalar metric perturbations about a flat Friedmann-Lemaitre-
Robertson-Walker (FLRW) background. These perturbations can be large during
preheating, breaking the conformal flatness of the background spacetime. We
compute numerically the total number of particles generated by the modes of the
metric perturbations which have grown sufficiently to become classical. In the
absence of inhomogeneities massless fermions are not gravitationally produced,
and then this effect may be relevant for abundance estimates of light
gravitational relics.Comment: 17 pages, 7 figures, accepted for publication in Nuclear Physics
Power-law inflation with a nonminimally coupled scalar field
We consider the dynamics of power-law inflation with a nonminimally coupled
scalar field . It is well known that multiple scalar fields with
exponential potentials lead to an inflationary solution even if the each scalar field is not
capable to sustain inflation. In this paper, we show that inflation can be
assisted even in the one-field case by the effect of nonminimal coupling. When
is positive, since an effective potential which arises by a conformal
transformation becomes flatter compared with the case of for ,
we have an inflationary solution even when the universe evolves as
non-inflationary in the minimally coupled case. For the negative , the
assisted inflation can take place when evolves in the region of
\.Comment: 12 pages, 6 figures, to appear in Phys. Rev.
Generalized Galileon cosmology
We study the cosmology of a generalized Galileon field with five
covariant Lagrangians in which is replaced by general scalar functions
(i=1,...,5). For these theories, the equations of motion remain
at second-order in time derivatives. We restrict the functional forms of
from the demand to obtain de Sitter solutions responsible for
dark energy. There are two possible choices for power-law functions
, depending on whether the coupling with the Ricci
scalar is independent of or depends on . The former
corresponds to the covariant Galileon theory that respects the Galilean
symmetry in the Minkowski space-time. For generalized Galileon theories we
derive the conditions for the avoidance of ghosts and Laplacian instabilities
associated with scalar and tensor perturbations as well as the condition for
the stability of de Sitter solutions. We also carry out detailed analytic and
numerical study for the cosmological dynamics in those theories.Comment: 24 pages, 10 figures, version to appear in Physical Review
Observational signatures of f(R) dark energy models that satisfy cosmological and local gravity constraints
We discuss observational consequences of f(R) dark energy scenarios that
satisfy local gravity constraints (LGC) as well as conditions of the
cosmological viability. The model we study is given by m(r)=C(-r-1)^p (C>0,
p>1) with m=Rf_{,RR}/f_{,R} and r=-Rf_{,R}/f, which cover viable f(R) models
proposed so far in a high-curvature region designed to be compatible with LGC.
The equation of state of dark energy exhibits a divergence at a redshift z_c
that can be as close as a few while satisfying sound horizon constraints of
Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB). We study the evolution of matter density
perturbations in details and place constraints on model parameters from the
difference of spectral indices of power spectra between CMB and galaxy
clustering. The models with p>5 can be consistent with those observational
constraints as well as LGC. We also discuss the evolution of perturbations in
the Ricci scalar R and show that an oscillating mode (scalaron) can easily
dominate over a matter-induced mode as we go back to the past. This violates
the stability of cosmological solutions, thus posing a problem about how the
over-production of scalarons should be avoided in the early universe.Comment: 13 pages, 7 figures, version to appear in Physical Review
Dynamics of inflationary cosmology in TVSD model
Within the framework of a model Universe with time variable space dimensions
(TVSD), known as decrumpling or TVSD model, we study TVSD chaotic inflation and
obtain dynamics of the inflaton, scale factor and spatial dimension. We also
study the quantum fluctuations of the inflaton field and obtain the spectral
index and its running in this model. Two classes of examples have been studied
and comparisons made with the standard slow-roll formulae. We compare our
results with the recent Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP) data.Comment: 18 pages, 3 figures, accepted in Mod. Phys. Lett.
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