R. Holman

Solutions to the strong CP problem in a world with gravity

We examine various solutions of the strong-CP problem to determine their sensitivity to possible violations of global symmetries by Plauck scale physics. While some solutions remain viable even in the face of such effects. Violations of the Peccei-Quinn (PQ) symmetry by non-renormalizable operators of dimension less than 10 will generally shift the value of {bar {theta}} to values inconsistent with the experimental bound {bar {theta}} {approx_lt} 10{sup {minus}}9. We show that it is possible to construct axion models where gauge symmetries protect PQ symmetry to the requisite level.

Enhanced non-Gaussianity from excited initial states

We use the techniques of effective field theory in an expanding universe to examine the effect of choosing an excited inflationary initial state built over the Bunch–Davies state on the CMB bi-spectrum. We find that, even for Hadamard states, there are unexpected enhancements in the bi-spectrum for certain configurations in momentum space due to interactions of modes in the early stages of inflation. These enhancements can be parametrically larger than the standard ones and are potentially observable in future data. These initial state effects have a characteristic signature in l-space which distinguishes them from the usual contributions, with the enhancement being most pronounced for configurations corresponding to flattened triangles for which two momenta are collinear.

Are inflationary predictions sensitive to very high energy physics

It has been proposed that the successful inflationary description of density perturbations on cosmological scales is sensitive to the details of physics at extremely high (trans-Planckian) energies. We test this proposal by examining how inflationary predictions depend on higher-energy scales within a simple model where the higher-energy physics is well understood. We find the best of all possible worlds: inflationary predictions are robust against the vast majority of high-energy effects, but can be sensitive to some effects in certain circumstances, in a way which does not violate ordinary notions of decoupling. This implies both that the comparison of inflationary predictions with CMB data is meaningful, and that it is also worth searching for small deviations from the standard results in the hopes of learning about very high energies.

Dissipation via particle production in scalar field theories.

We study the nonequilibrium evolution of the expectation value of a scalar field in the broken and unbroken symmetry cases. We find that the particles produced by parametric amplification give rise to dissipative behavior for this mode. However, a {Gamma} {center_dot}{phi} type of term {ital cannot} account for the dissipational dynamics. We are able to show clearly that perturbation theory breaks down at late times, so that dissipation in field theories can only be understood nonperturbatively. When Goldstone bosons are present we find infrared divergences that require a nonperturbative resummation to describe the long-time dynamics. We use the Hartree factorization and the large {ital N} approximation to the O({ital N}) linear {sigma} model to numerically as well as analytically understand the long-time behavior of the zero mode as well as that of the produced particles. The O({ital N}) model case is extremely interesting since, in the spontaneously broken case, the radial mode dissipates all of its energy into production of long-wavelength Goldstone modes. The minima of the effective action (determined by the final value of the expectation value of the scalar field) depend on the initial conditions.

Super-Hubble de Sitter fluctuations and the dynamical RG

Perturbative corrections to correlation functions for interacting theories in de Sitter spacetime often grow secularly with time, due to the properties of fluctuations on super-Hubble scales. This growth can lead to a breakdown of perturbation theory at late times. We argue that Dynamical Renormalization Group (DRG) techniques provide a convenient framework for interpreting and resumming these secularly growing terms. In the case of a massless scalar field in de Sitter with quartic self-interaction, the resummed result is also less singular in the infrared, in precisely the manner expected if a dynamical mass is generated. We compare this improved infrared behavior with large-N expansions when applicable.

Breakdown of Semiclassical Methods in de Sitter Space

Massless interacting scalar fields in de Sitter space have long been known to experience large fluctuations over length scales larger than Hubble distances. A similar situation arises in condensed matter physics in the vicinity of a critical point, and in this better-understood situation these large fluctuations indicate the failure in this regime of mean-field methods. We argue that for non-Goldstone scalars in de Sitter space, these fluctuations can also be interpreted as signaling the complete breakdown of the semi-classical methods widely used throughout cosmology. By power-counting the infrared properties of Feynman graphs in de Sitter space we find that for a massive scalar interacting through a λ 4 interaction, control over the loop approximation is lost for masses smaller than m √λ H/2π, where H is the Hubble scale. We briefly discuss some potential implications for inflationary cosmology.

Effective field theories and inflation

We investigate the possible influence of very-high-energy physics on inflationary predictions, focusing on whether effective field theories can allow effects which are parametrically larger than order H2/M2, where M is the scale of heavy physics and H is the Hubble scale at horizon exit. By investigating supersymmetric hybrid inflation models, we show that decoupling does not preclude heavy physics having effects for the CMB with observable size even if H2/M2O(1%), although their presence can only be inferred from observations given some a priori assumptions about the inflationary mechanism. Our analysis differs from the results of our earlier work, in which other kinds of heavy-physics effects were found which could alter inflationary predictions for CMB fluctuations, inasmuch as the heavy-physics \emph{can} be integrated out here to produce an effective field theory description of low-energy physics. We argue, as in our earlier work, that the potential presence of heavy-physics effects in the CMB does not alter the predictions of inflation for generic models, but does make the search for deviations from standard predictions worthwhile.

Effective field theory and non-Gaussianity from general inflationary states

A bstractWe study the effects of non-trivial initial quantum states for inflationary fluctuations within the context of the effective field theory for inflation constructed by Cheung et al. which allows us to discriminate between different initial states in a model-independent way. We develop a Green’s function/path integral based formulation that incorporates initial state effects and use it to address questions such as how state-dependent is the consistency relation for the bispectrum, how many e-folds beyond the minimum required to solve the cosmological fine tunings of the big bang are we allowed so that some information from the initial state survives until late times, among others. We find that the so-called consistency condition relating the local limit of the bispectrum and the slow-roll parameter is a state-dependent statement that can be avoided for physically consistent initial states either with or without initial non-Gaussianities.

Linear versus nonlinear relaxation: Consequences for reheating and thermalization

We consider the case of a scalar field, the inflaton, coupled to both lighter scalars and fermions, and the study the relaxation of the inflaton via particle production in both the linear and non-linear regimes. This has an immediate application to the reheating problem in inflationary universe models. The linear regime analysis offers a rationale for the standard approach to the reheating problem, but we make a distinction between relaxation and ther-malization. We find that particle production when the inflaton starts in the non-linear region is typically a far more efficient way of transfering energy out of the inflaton zero mode and into the quanta of the lighter scalar than single particle decay. For the non-linear regime we take into account self-consistently the evolution of the expectation value of the inflaton field coupled to the evolution of the quantum fluctuations. An exhaustive numerical analysis reveals that the distribution of produced particles is far from thermal and the effect of open channels. In the fermionic case, Pauli blocking begins to hinder the transfer of energy into the fermion modes very early on in the evolution of the inflaton. We examine the implications of our results to the question of how to calculate the reheating temperature of the universe after inflation.

Scalar field dynamics in Friedmann-Robertson-Walker spacetimes

We study the nonlinear dynamics of quantum fields in matter- and radiation-dominated universes, using the nonequilibrium field theory approach combined with the nonperturbative Hartree and the large N approximations. We examine the phenomenon of explosive particle production due to spinodal instabilities and parametric amplification in expanding universes with and without symmetry breaking. For a variety of initial conditions, we compute the evolution of the inflaton, its quantum fluctuations, and the equation of state. We find explosive growth of quantum fluctuations, although particle production is somewhat sensitive to the expansion of the universe. In the large N limit for symmetry-breaking scenarios, we determine generic late time solutions for any flat Friedmann-Robertson-Walker (FRW) cosmology. We also present a complete and numerically implementable renormalization scheme for the equation of motion and the energy momentum tensor in flat FRW cosmologies. In this scheme the renormalization constants are independent of time and of the initial conditions. {copyright} {ital 1997} {ital The American Physical Society}