Rights statement: This is the author’s version of a work that was accepted for publication in Astroparticle Physics. Changes resulting from the publishing process, such as peer review, editing, corrections, structural formatting, and other quality control mechanisms may not be reflected in this document. Changes may have been made to this work since it was submitted for publication. A definitive version was subsequently published in Astroparticle Physics, 94, 2017 DOI: 10.1016/j.astropartphys.2017.06.006
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Final published version
Research output: Contribution to Journal/Magazine › Journal article › peer-review
Research output: Contribution to Journal/Magazine › Journal article › peer-review
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TY - JOUR
T1 - Initial conditions for inflation
AU - Dimopoulos, Konstantinos
AU - Artymowski, Michał
N1 - This is the author’s version of a work that was accepted for publication in Astroparticle Physics. Changes resulting from the publishing process, such as peer review, editing, corrections, structural formatting, and other quality control mechanisms may not be reflected in this document. Changes may have been made to this work since it was submitted for publication. A definitive version was subsequently published in Astroparticle Physics, 94, 2017 DOI: 10.1016/j.astropartphys.2017.06.006
PY - 2017/9
Y1 - 2017/9
N2 - Within the α-attractors framework we investigate scalar potentials with the same pole as the one featured in the kinetic term. We show that, in field space, this leads to directions without a plateau. Using this, we present a proposal, which manages to overcome the initial conditions problem of inflation with a plateau. An earlier period of proto-inflation, beginning at Planck scale, accounts for the Universe expansion and arranges the required initial conditions for inflation on the plateau to commence. We show that, if proto-inflation is power-law, it does not suffer from a sub-Planckian eternal inflationary stage, which would otherwise be a problem. A simple model realisation is constructed in the context of α-attractors, which can both generate the inflationary plateau and the exponential slopes around it, necessary for the two inflation stages. Our mechanism allows to assume chaotic initial conditions at the Planck scale for proto-inflation, it is generic and it is shown to work without fine-tuning.
AB - Within the α-attractors framework we investigate scalar potentials with the same pole as the one featured in the kinetic term. We show that, in field space, this leads to directions without a plateau. Using this, we present a proposal, which manages to overcome the initial conditions problem of inflation with a plateau. An earlier period of proto-inflation, beginning at Planck scale, accounts for the Universe expansion and arranges the required initial conditions for inflation on the plateau to commence. We show that, if proto-inflation is power-law, it does not suffer from a sub-Planckian eternal inflationary stage, which would otherwise be a problem. A simple model realisation is constructed in the context of α-attractors, which can both generate the inflationary plateau and the exponential slopes around it, necessary for the two inflation stages. Our mechanism allows to assume chaotic initial conditions at the Planck scale for proto-inflation, it is generic and it is shown to work without fine-tuning.
KW - Cosmic inflation
U2 - 10.1016/j.astropartphys.2017.06.006
DO - 10.1016/j.astropartphys.2017.06.006
M3 - Journal article
VL - 94
SP - 11
EP - 16
JO - Astroparticle Physics
JF - Astroparticle Physics
SN - 0927-6505
ER -