Résumé / Abstract Journal-club_GReCO

Séminaire / Seminar GReCO

« Time-reversed Stochastic Inflation »

Christophe Ringeval
Centre de Cosmologie, Physique des Particules et Phénoménologie, Université de Louvain (Louvain-la-Neuve, Belgique)

Cosmic inflation may exhibit stochastic periods during which quantum
fluctuations dominate over the semi-classical evolution, arguably
triggering an eternal regime associated with strong inhomogeneities.
We present a time-reversed approach to stochastic inflation, based on a
reverse Fokker-Planck equation, which allows us to derive
non-perturbatively the probability distribution of the field values at a
given time before the end of the quantum regime. As a motivated example,
we solve the pathological flat semi-infinite potential, having a drift
term or not, and derive a new and exact formula for the probability
distribution of the quantum-generated curvature fluctuations. This one
is always normalisable, exhibiting either exponential or Levy tails
according to the drift value. Large inhomogeneities therefore exist but
our result shows that nothing really bad happens when inflation becomes
purely quantum.
lundi 2 février 2026 - 11:00
Salle des séminaires Évry Schatzman
Institut d'Astrophysique de Paris
Pages web du séminaire / Seminar's webpage