Theory Group Special Seminar, 03 April 2018
Masaki Yamada, Tufts University
Inflation in Random Gaussian Landscapes
abstract
String theory combined with inflationary cosmology has led to the picture of inflationary multiverse, populated by a multitude of vacua with diverse properties. Our Universe begins with a quantum tunneling from an eternally-inflating parent vacuum, followed by a period of slow-roll inflation. The details of the high-energy vacuum landscape are not well understood, and its effective field theory is often modeled as random Gaussian fields. In this talk, I will focus on small-field inflation in the landscape of the random Gaussian fields and explain that inflation is not multi-field, the probability for future detection of spatial curvature is rather low (P ~ 0.001), and the distribution for the amplitude of density fluctuations has a unique shape and a preferred domain.