McGill.CA / Science / Department of Physics

Pizzaless Informal Pizza Seminar

Quintessence, Inflation and the Shape Moduli

Tirthabir Biswas

McGill

I will try to show that even in the simple framework of pure Kaluza-Klein gravity the shape moduli can generate potentials which can support inflation and/or quintessence. Using the shape moduli or the squashing field as the inflaton or quintessence-field has the additional benefit of being able to explain symmetry breaking in a natural geometric way. Preliminary numerical analysis suggests, that in these models it may be possible to obtain sufficient e-foldings during inflation as well as a small cosmological constant at the current epoch (without fine tuning), while preserving the constraint coming from the fine structure constant.

Monday, October 20th 2003, 13:30
Ernest Rutherford Physics Building, room 326