Abstract
In the past decade, the importance of dissipation and fluctuation to
inflationary dynamics has been realized and has led to a new picture of
inflation called warm inflation. Although these phenomena are common to
condensed matter systems, for inflation models their importance has only
recently started to be appreciated. The article describes the motivation
for these phenomena during inflation and then examines their origins
from first principles quantum field theory treatments of inflation
models. Cosmology today is a data intensive field and this is driving
theory to greater precision and predictability. This opens the
possibility to consider tests for detecting observational signatures of
dissipative processes, which will be discussed. In addition, it will be
discussed how particle physics and cosmology are now working in tandem
to push the boundaries of our knowledge about fundamental physics.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 33-49 |
| Number of pages | 17 |
| Journal | Contemporary Physics |
| Volume | 47 |
| Issue number | 1 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - 1 Jan 2006 |