NANOGrav Signal from double-inflection-point inflation and dark matter

TL;DR

This paper explores whether inflationary models with double-inflection points can explain the NANOGrav gravitational wave signal, while also analyzing reheating, dark matter production, and model stability.

Contribution

It introduces a double-inflection-point inflation model that accounts for the NANOGrav signal and examines related dark matter and reheating processes.

Findings

The GW spectrum fits within the 2σ NANOGrav constraints.

Reheating temperature and dark matter production are consistent with observational bounds.

The inflationary potential remains radiatively stable under one-loop corrections.

Abstract

The NANOGrav collaboration has published a suspected stochastic GW background signal in its analysis of 12.5 years PTA data, so in this work, we investigate the possibility to explain the signal by the inflationary models with double-inflection-point. We calculate the energy spectrum of GWs induced by scalar perturbations, and show that the curve lies in the $2\sigma$ region of the NANOGrav constraints. In addition, we analyze the reheating process and dark matter production by assuming that the inflaton is coupled with the SM Higgs boson and singlet fermionic dark matter field. We discuss the radiative stability of the inflationary potential under one-loop corrections, calculate the reheating temperature, the dark matter production, and constraints the coupling parameters using the bounds of BBN, Lyman-$\alpha$, etc.