Symmetry Breaking Patterns for Inflation

Abstract

We study inflationary models where the kinetic sector of the theory has a non-linearly realised symmetry which is broken by the inflationary potential. We distinguish between kinetic symmetries which non-linearly realise an internal or space-time group, and which yield a flat or curved scalar manifold. This classification leads to well-known inflationary models such as monomial inflation and $\alpha$-attractors, as well as a new model based on fixed couplings between a dilaton and many axions which non-linearly realises higher-dimensional conformal symmetries. In this model, inflation can be realised along the dilatonic direction, leading to a tensor-to-scalar ratio $r\sim 0.01$ and a spectral index $n_s\sim 0.975$. We refer to the new model as ambient inflation since inflation proceeds along an isometry of an anti-de Sitter ambient space-time, which fully determines the kinetic sector.

References added, discussion of Wess-Zumino term extended

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Cited by in corpus (4)

• On the inflationary massive field with a curved field manifold
• An Algebraic Classification of Exceptional EFTs
• Scale-invariant alternatives to general relativity. III. The inflation--dark-energy connection
• Inflation as a spontaneous symmetry breaking of Weyl symmetry