Nonminimal Couplings in the Early Universe: Multifield Models of Inflation and the Latest Observations
Models of cosmic inflation suggest that our universe underwent an early phase of accelerated expansion, driven by the dynamics of one or more scalar fields. Inflationary models make specific, quantitative predictions for several observable quantities, including particular patterns of temperature an...
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| Other Authors: | |
| Format: | Article |
| Language: | en_US |
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Springer-Verlag
2017
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| Online Access: | http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/108029 https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5054-6744 |
| _version_ | 1826200429841612800 |
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| author | Kaiser, David I. |
| author2 | Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Center for Theoretical Physics |
| author_facet | Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Center for Theoretical Physics Kaiser, David I. |
| author_sort | Kaiser, David I. |
| collection | MIT |
| description | Models of cosmic inflation suggest that our universe underwent an early
phase of accelerated expansion, driven by the dynamics of one or more scalar fields. Inflationary models make specific, quantitative predictions for several observable quantities, including particular patterns of temperature anistropies in the cosmic microwave background radiation. Realistic models of high-energy physics include many scalar fields at high energies. Moreover, we may expect these fields to have nonminimal couplings to the spacetime curvature. Such couplings are quite generic, arising as renormalization counterterms when quantizing scalar fields in
curved spacetime. In this chapter I review recent research on a general class of multifield inflationary models with nonminimal couplings. Models in this class exhibit a strong attractor behavior: across a wide range of couplings and initial conditions, the fields evolve along a single-field trajectory for most of inflation. Across large regions of phase space and parameter space, therefore, models in this general class yield robust predictions for observable quantities that fall squarely within the “sweet
spot” of recent observations. |
| first_indexed | 2024-09-23T11:36:21Z |
| format | Article |
| id | mit-1721.1/108029 |
| institution | Massachusetts Institute of Technology |
| language | en_US |
| last_indexed | 2024-09-23T11:36:21Z |
| publishDate | 2017 |
| publisher | Springer-Verlag |
| record_format | dspace |
| spelling | mit-1721.1/1080292022-09-27T20:41:21Z Nonminimal Couplings in the Early Universe: Multifield Models of Inflation and the Latest Observations Kaiser, David I. Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Center for Theoretical Physics Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Physics Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Program in Science, Technology and Society Kaiser, David I Kaiser, David I. Models of cosmic inflation suggest that our universe underwent an early phase of accelerated expansion, driven by the dynamics of one or more scalar fields. Inflationary models make specific, quantitative predictions for several observable quantities, including particular patterns of temperature anistropies in the cosmic microwave background radiation. Realistic models of high-energy physics include many scalar fields at high energies. Moreover, we may expect these fields to have nonminimal couplings to the spacetime curvature. Such couplings are quite generic, arising as renormalization counterterms when quantizing scalar fields in curved spacetime. In this chapter I review recent research on a general class of multifield inflationary models with nonminimal couplings. Models in this class exhibit a strong attractor behavior: across a wide range of couplings and initial conditions, the fields evolve along a single-field trajectory for most of inflation. Across large regions of phase space and parameter space, therefore, models in this general class yield robust predictions for observable quantities that fall squarely within the “sweet spot” of recent observations. United States. Dept. of Energy (Contract de-sc0012567) 2017-04-10T20:13:04Z 2017-04-10T20:13:04Z 2016 Article http://purl.org/eprint/type/BookItem 978-3-319-31299-6 http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/108029 Kaiser, David I. "Nonminimal Couplings in the Early Universe: Multifield Models of Inflation and the Latest Observations." At The Frontier of Spacetime: Scalar-Tensor Theory, Bells Inequality, Machs Principle, Exotic Smoothness. Ed. Torsten Asselmeyer-Maluga. Switzerland: Springer, 2016. pp. 41-59. https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5054-6744 en_US http://www.springer.com/us/book/9783319312972 At the Frontier of Spacetime: Scalar-Tensor Theory, Bells Inequality, Machs Principle, Exotic Smoothness Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/ application/pdf Springer-Verlag arXiv |
| spellingShingle | Kaiser, David I. Nonminimal Couplings in the Early Universe: Multifield Models of Inflation and the Latest Observations |
| title | Nonminimal Couplings in the Early Universe: Multifield Models of Inflation and the Latest Observations |
| title_full | Nonminimal Couplings in the Early Universe: Multifield Models of Inflation and the Latest Observations |
| title_fullStr | Nonminimal Couplings in the Early Universe: Multifield Models of Inflation and the Latest Observations |
| title_full_unstemmed | Nonminimal Couplings in the Early Universe: Multifield Models of Inflation and the Latest Observations |
| title_short | Nonminimal Couplings in the Early Universe: Multifield Models of Inflation and the Latest Observations |
| title_sort | nonminimal couplings in the early universe multifield models of inflation and the latest observations |
| url | http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/108029 https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5054-6744 |
| work_keys_str_mv | AT kaiserdavidi nonminimalcouplingsintheearlyuniversemultifieldmodelsofinflationandthelatestobservations |