Narrow Results

The recent three-year WMAP data selects large-field models with certain power-law potentials and small-field models for all power-law potentials as consistent inflation models. We study the large-field and small-field inflation model with a quadratic and a quartic potential within the framework of quantum field theory in an expanding Friedmann-Robertson-Walker universe. We find that quantum fluctuations in the small-field model lead to a significant contribution to the effective potential and may have non-negligible effects on the slow-roll parameters predicted by classical theory.

In order to validate or invalidate a large class of low energy effective theories, the swampland conjecture has attracted significant attention recently. It can be stated as inequalities on the potential of a scalar field which is conjectured to satisfy certain constraints. In this work, we discuss the theoretical viability of deformed Starobinsky gravity in light of the refined swampland conjectures. We consider the deformation of the form $f(R)\sim R^{2(1-\alpha )}$ with $\alpha$ being a constant. We then constrain $\alpha$ using the spectral index of curvature perturbation $n_s$ and the tensor-to-scalar ratio $r$. We demonstrate that the model under consideration is in strong tension with the refined swampland conjecture. However, regarding our analysis with proper choices of parameters $a,b=1-a$ and $q$, we discover that the model can always satisfy this new refined swampland conjecture. Therefore, the model might be in “landscape” since the “further refining de Sitter swampland conjecture” is satisfied.