# Non-Minimal Coupling of the Higgs Boson to Curvature in an Inflationary Universe

## TL;DR

This paper explores how a non-minimal coupling of the Higgs boson to spacetime curvature can stabilize the electroweak vacuum during high-scale inflation, preventing catastrophic decay.

## Contribution

It demonstrates that non-minimal Higgs-curvature coupling can stabilize the electroweak vacuum during inflation, a novel solution to a major cosmological challenge.

## Key findings

- Non-minimal coupling stabilizes the Higgs vacuum during inflation.
- Specific initial conditions allow the Higgs to reach the electroweak vacuum.
- The mechanism prevents vacuum decay at high inflationary scales.

## Abstract

In the absence of new physics around $10^{10}$ GeV, the electroweak vacuum is at best metastable. This represents a major challenge for high scale inflationary models as, during the early rapid expansion of the universe, it seems difficult to understand how the Higgs vacuum would not decay to the true lower vacuum of the theory with catastrophic consequences if inflation took place at a scale above $10^{10}$ GeV. In this paper we show that the non-minimal coupling of the Higgs boson to curvature could solve this problem by generating a direct coupling of the Higgs boson to the inflationary potential thereby stabilizing the electroweak vacuum. For specific values of the Higgs field initial condition and of its non-minimal coupling, inflation can drive the Higgs field to the electroweak vacuum quickly during inflation.