# Gravitational wave production after inflation with cuspy potentials

## TL;DR

This paper explores how the cuspiness of scalar potentials influences gravitational wave production during oscillon formation after inflation, revealing that cuspy potentials generate stronger gravitational wave signals with a double-peak spectrum.

## Contribution

It introduces a generalized potential model that interpolates between cuspy and smooth potentials, demonstrating the impact on gravitational wave signals and oscillon formation.

## Key findings

- Cuspy potentials produce stronger gravitational wave signals.
- Oscillon formation is enhanced in cuspy potentials.
- A quasi matter-dominated stage occurs after inflation.

## Abstract

We investigate the effect of the cuspiness of scalar potentials on the production of gravitational waves during oscillon formation after inflation. We consider a more general form of potentials with a mass parameter $M$, which repoduce cuspy potentials for fields much larger than $M$, and smooth potentials in the opposite limit. For cuspy potentials, nonsmooth oscillations of the inflaton induce an amplification of the inflaton fluctuations at the bottom of the potential, so that oscillons copiously form, which leads to a significant stochastic gravitational wave background with a double-peak spectrum. By varying the parameter $M$, we find that cuspy potentials yield stronger signals of gravitational waves and the generation of gravitational waves disappears for smooth potentials. Moreover, we calculate the equation of state after inflation and find the presence of a quasi matter-dominated stage right before the transition to the radiation-dominated stage.