Non-Standard Primordial Clocks from Dynamical Mass in Alternative to Inflation Scenarios

TL;DR

This paper explores how dynamically generated heavy field masses can serve as non-standard primordial clocks, offering a new way to distinguish alternative cosmological scenarios from inflation through oscillatory signals.

Contribution

It introduces the concept of non-standard primordial clocks arising from dynamical mass generation, expanding the toolkit for probing early universe models beyond standard inflation.

Findings

Dynamically generated masses can produce oscillatory signals similar to standard clocks.

Scale dependence differences can help distinguish non-standard clocks from standard inflation clocks.

Heavy fields with time-dependent masses can serve as effective probes of alternative cosmological scenarios.

Abstract

In the primordial universe, oscillations of heavy fields can be considered as standard clocks to measure the expansion or contraction history of the universe. Those standard clocks provide a model-independent way of distinguishing inflation and alternative scenarios. However, the mass of the heavy fields may not be a constant mass, but rather mass dynamically generated by non-minimal coupling to the Ricci scalar, or self-interactions. In the case of dynamically generated mass, the mass of the heavy field is generically of order Hubble, and thus is time-dependent in alternative to inflation scenarios. We show that such dynamically generated mass terms can be considered as non-standard primordial clocks for alternative to inflation, providing similar oscillatory frequencies as standard clocks of inflation. Additional information on scale dependence can distinguish such non-standard clocks from standard clocks.