Axions of Evil

Abstract

We provide a systematic framework for theories of multiple axions. We discover a novel type of "alignment" that renders even very complex theories analytically tractable. Theories with about 100 axions and random parameters have an exponential number of meta-stable vacua and accommodate a diverse range of inflationary observables. Very light fields can serve as dark matter with the correct abundance. Tunneling from a minimum with large vacuum energy can occur via a thin-wall instanton and be followed by a sufficient period of slow-roll inflation that ends in a vacuum containing axion dark matter and a cosmological constant with a value consistent with observation. Hence, this model can reproduce many macroscopic features of our universe without tuned parameters.

5 pages, 2 figures

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• An Ultralight Axion in Supersymmetry and Strings and Cosmology at Small Scales
• Friendship in the Axiverse: Late-time direct and astrophysical signatures of early-time nonlinear axion dynamics
• Crunching Away the Cosmological Constant Problem: Dynamical Selection of a Small $\Lambda$
• Axion Landscape Cosmology
• Axion Hilltops, Kahler Modulus Quintessence and the Swampland Criteria
• Constraining Ultralight Axions with Galaxy Surveys
• Improved Halo Model Calibrations for Mixed Dark Matter Models of Ultralight Axions
• A Quantal Theory of Restoration of Strong CP Symmetry
• Axion scales and couplings with Stückelberg mixing