Observable Gravitational Waves From Kinetically Modified Non-Minimal Inflation

TL;DR

This paper explores models of chaotic inflation with non-minimal couplings and kinetic terms, showing they can produce observable gravitational waves consistent with recent experimental data while maintaining theoretical consistency.

Contribution

It introduces a new class of inflationary models with non-minimal kinetic terms that align with observational data and preserve unitarity up to the Planck scale.

Findings

Inflationary models compatible with BICEP2/Keck and Planck data

Inflation achieved with subplanckian inflaton values

Models maintain perturbative unitarity up to the Planck scale

Abstract

We consider Supersymmetric (SUSY) and non-SUSY models of chaotic inflation based on the simplest power-law potential with exponents n=2 and 4. We propose a convenient non-minimal coupling to gravity and a non-minimal kinetic term which ensure, mainly for n=4, inflationary observables favored by the BICEP2/Keck Array and Planck results. Inflation can be attained for subplanckian inflaton values with the corresponding effective theories retaining the perturbative unitarity up to the Planck scale.