Review of inflationary cosmology via quantum corrections in M-theory

Abstract

In this paper, we review inflationary cosmology in M-theory with quantum corrections. In old days the inflation was proposed as a resolution to the cosmological problems, and nowadays models of the inflation are severely restricted by the observations. Among them, the predictions of the Starobinsky model, which contains scalar curvature squared term, is consistent with the observations. The higher curvature terms will come from quantum effect of the gravity, and it is natural to ask its origin in superstring theory or M-theory. We investigate inflationary solution in the M-theory with higher curvature terms. We show that higher curvature terms induce an exponentially expanding solution in the early universe, and the inflation naturally ends when the corrections are suppressed. We also discuss that the ambiguity of the higher curvature terms do not affect the inflationary scenario in the M-theory.