Can Back-Reaction Prevent Eternal Inflation?

TL;DR

This paper investigates how back-reaction from long wavelength fluctuations influences different inflationary models, finding it prevents eternal inflation in cyclic Ekpyrotic scenarios but not in power-law or Starobinsky inflation.

Contribution

It provides a comparative analysis of back-reaction effects across multiple inflationary models, highlighting its role in terminating eternal inflation in cyclic scenarios.

Findings

Back-reaction effects are weak in power-law and Starobinsky inflation.

Back-reaction prevents unlimited growth in cyclic Ekpyrotic models.

Eternal inflation is not halted by back-reaction in some models.

Abstract

We study the effects which the back-reaction of long wavelength fluctuations exert on stochastic inflation. In the cases of power-law and Starobinsky inflation these effects are too weak to terminate the stochastic growth of the inflaton field. However, in the case of the cyclic Ekpyrotic scenario, the back-reaction effects prevent the unlimited growth of the scalar field.