Speaker: Sravan Kumar (UBI) Date: Tuesday, DEC 1st, 2015 Time: 11:30 am

Abstract: In this talk, we start with a review on the concept of cosmological attractor models (CAM) in the sense of their use as a generalization of simpler models such as Starobinsky and Higgs Inflation. These models were found to be quite compatible with the CMB data and also consistent in the context of N=1 SUGRA. We will then discuss in detail the framework of $\alpha$- attractor models in the context of slow-roll inflation. Subsequently, we study the possibility of non-slow-roll inflation in $\alpha$- attractor models by relaxing the requirement of inflaton potential flatness and allow a sufficiently steep potential to support 60-efoldings. We show that within non-slow-roll dynamics, the $\alpha$-attractor model is compatible with any value of r < 0.1. We further explore the relation between inflaton dynamics and the $\alpha$ parameter, which is also related to the curvature of Kähler manifold in the SUGRA embedding of this model.

Broadcasted through our yourtube channel:
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC4xL-eUZGAUxpKCPsqLAddA

Funded by the Portuguese Government through the FCT – Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia under the project UID/MAT/00212/2013