Supersymmetric Dirac-Born-Infeld axionic inflation and non-Gaussianity

Abstract

Abstract An analysis is given of inflation based on a supersymmetric Dirac-Born-Infeld (DBI) action in an axionic landscape. The DBI model we discuss involves a landscape of chiral superfields with one U(1) shift symmetry which is broken by instanton type non-perturbative terms in the superpotential. Breaking of the shift symmetry leads to one pseudo-Nambu-Goldstone-boson which acts as the inflaton while the remaining normalized phases of the chiral fields generically labeled axions are invariant under the U(1) shift symmetry. The analysis is carried out in the vacuum with stabilized saxions, which are the magnitudes of the chiral fields. Regions of the parameter space where slow-roll inflation occurs are exhibited and the spectral indices as well as the ratio of the tensor to the scalar power spectrum are computed. An interesting aspect of supersymmetric DBI models analyzed is that in most of the parameter space tensor to scalar ratio and scalar spectral index are consistent with Planck data if slow roll occurs and is not eternal. Also interesting is that the ratio of the tensor to the scalar power spectrum can be large and can lie close to the experimental upper limit and thus testable in improved experiment. Non-Gaussianity in this class of models is explored.