Anisotropies in icosahedral inflation

Abstract: In this talk, I will present recent work done on analyzing the unique observational imprints of icosahedral inflation. Icosahedral inflation is a variation of solid inflation, in which the dynamics of the system are driven by a triplet of scalars satisfying internal icosahedral symmetry. This model is motivated by a hunt for an intrinsically anisotropic symmetry that gives isotropic background stress tensor and two-point function, and the model predicts a completely isotropic scalar power spectrum while introducing anisotropic corrections to the tensor power spectrum and the bispectrum. A mixed scalar-tensor two-point function is also allowed. Observationally, it is possible to have a maximally anisotropic scalar bispectrum, and non-zero T-B and E-B correlations for the CMB temperature-polarization spectrum. The statistical anisotropies also give rise to non-zero bipolar spherical harmonics and bipolar power spectrum, which are calculated and will be discussed in the talk.

cosmology and nongalactic astrophysicsother condensed matterquantum gasesstrongly correlated electronssuperconductivitygeneral relativity and quantum cosmologyHEP - theory

Audience: researchers in the topic

Carnegie Mellon theoretical physics