Abstract
We study a new model of quintessential inflation which is inspired by supergravity and string theory. The model features a kinetic pole, which gives rise to the inflationary plateau, and a runaway quintessential tail. We envisage a coupling between the inflaton and the Peccei-Quinn (PQ) field which terminates the roll of the runaway inflaton and traps the latter at an enhanced symmetry point (ESP), thereby breaking the PQ symmetry. The kinetic density of the inflaton is transferred to the newly created thermal bath of the hot big bang due to the decay of PQ particles. The model successfully accounts for the observations of inflation and dark energy without any fine-tuning, while also resolving the strong CP problem of QCD and generating axionic dark matter, without isocurvature perturbations. Trapping the inflaton at the ESP ensures that the model does not suffer from the infamous 5th force problem, which typically plagues quintessence.
Highlights
We have most of the history of the Universe figured out
We study a new model of quintessential inflation which is inspired by supergravity and string theory
We envisage a coupling between the inflaton and the Peccei-Quinn (PQ) field which terminates the roll of the runaway inflaton and traps the latter at an enhanced symmetry point (ESP), thereby breaking the PQ symmetry
Summary
We have most of the history of the Universe figured out. The hot big bang model covers pretty much the entire timeline, from a few seconds after the original explosion until the present time, almost. The problem is that the associated vacuum density has to be comparable to the density of the Universe today, which is about 120 orders of magnitude smaller than the “natural” value of Λ This has been called (by Lawrence Krauss) “the worst finetuning in physics”. It is important to point out that the quintessence proposal does not solve the cosmological constant problem because Λ is still assumed to be zero due to some unknown symmetry Since they are both based on the same idea, it is natural to unify the two in quintessential inflation [9,10] (for a recent list of references see [11,12] and [13,14]), which considers that the inflaton field survives until today and becomes quintessence. 8πG 1⁄4 m−P2, where mP 1⁄4 2.43 × 1018 GeV is the reduced Planck mass
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