CMB observables and reheat temperature as a window to models of inflation and freeze-in dark matter production

TL;DR

This paper presents a systematic method to use CMB data and reheating temperature to distinguish inflation models and connect them to dark matter production scenarios, with implications for future observations.

Contribution

It introduces a framework linking CMB observables, reheating temperature, and dark matter models, providing narrow testable bounds for inflation classes.

Findings

Reheating temperature is uniquely determined by CMB observables for standard reheating.

Narrow bounds on spectral index $n_s$ strongly test inflation models with current and future data.

Reheating temperature constraints can inform dark matter production mechanisms.

Abstract

A systematic approach is presented for using CMB observables and reheating temperature for discriminating between various models of inflation and certain freeze-in dark matter scenarios. It is applied to several classes of $\alpha$-attractor models as an illustrative example. In the first step, all independent parameters of the inflationary potential are expressed in terms of the CMB observables (the three parameters - by the scalar spectral index $n_s$, scalar amplitude $A_s$ and the tensor-to-scalar amplitude ratio $r$). For a standard reheating mechanism characterized by the inflaton equation of state parameter $w$ and its effective dissipation rate $\Gamma$ the reheating temperature is uniquely fixed in terms of the CMB observables measured for some pivot scale $k_*$. There are striking consequences of this fact. The model independent bounds on the reheating temperature, the BBN lower bound and the upper bound of the order of the GUT/Planck scale, translate themselves for each class of models into very narrow ranges of the allowed values of the spectral index $n_s(k_*)$, providing their strong tests by the present and future CMB data. The recent tension between Planck and DESI-ACT results has strong impact on our conclusions. Furthermore, given a class of inflaton models satisfying those tests, the reheating temperature is an interesting portal to link the CMB observables to the particle physics scenarios that are sensitive to it. As an example, non-thermal dark matter (DM) production mechanisms are discussed. One obtains then a consistency check between theories of inflation and DM production. If the future precision of the CMB data will constrain the reheating temperature beyond the model independent bounds, further constraints on the DM production will follow.