We will present a ”field study” of different settings of particle production in an inflationary universe.
Initially we will see a unified model in which, based on an incomplete decay of an inflaton, the same field describes inflation and dark matter. The inflaton interact with right-handed neutrinos and sneutrinos and we study extensively all of the possible cosmological scenarios that lead to standard cosmology. We follow the evolution of the dark matter sector, the remnant inflaton content and we find DM solutions with WIMP, FIMP or oscillating scalar field candidates.
Another case of particle production during inflation is then discussed as we focus on the tachyonic gauge particle production in the standard setting of axion inflation. We study the system in the weak coupling regime and calculate the gravitational wave spectrum produced from this interaction. By adding charged particles to the game we are in the proper conditions for the non-perturbative particle production with the Schwinger effect in an expanding background. We will do a study of the particular case in a de Sitter metric and constant electric field, and revise the renormalization of the divergent currents and conductivities addressing reported negative conductivities.
Finally, we will start an analysis towards a study of the effects of curved spacetime backgrounds on gravitational waves. With this goal, will try to connect duality symmetries in gravity, in particular for the linear perturbations, to the electric-magnetic duality symmetry for electrodynamics in the absence of sources.
Organized by: Catarina Cosme