Higgs-dilaton inflation and the early-late universe connection

by Dr Garcia-Bellido Juan (IFT-UAM/CSIC)

Thursday 12 Dec 2013, 15:00 → 16:30 Europe/Rome

Sala Riunioni (Dipartimento di Fisica e Astronomia)

In this talk I will discuss the possibility that the Higgs mass of 126 GeV may be hinting at a new fundamental symmetry, scale invariance, connecting the Fermi and Planck scales. The predictions of this model are a period of inflation driven by the Higgs acting as the inflaton and a late universe acceleration driven by the dilaton, the Goldstone boson associated with the breaking of scale invariance. The scalar spectral index in this model is the same as for Higgs inflation, ns=0.967, and the ratio of tensor to scalar amplitude is r=0.0033, in agreement with Planck observations of the CMB. Furthermore, there is a specific prediction for the equation of state of dark energy today,which is related to the scalar spectral index, 3(1+w)=1-ns, as well as the running of both: 3wa=-dns/dlogk. Future observations by PRISM and Euclid will be able to rule out this model.