Speaker
Description
Phase transitions in the early universe are critical events that played a crucial role in shaping the structure and properties of the cosmos.
Understanding these transitions is essential for constructing a comprehensive picture of the early universe's evolution.
In this work, we present a detailed description of the symmetry breaking dynamics of a beyond the Standard Model extension. This comes in the form of a scalar field non-minimally coupled to the Gauss-Bonnet invariant, which induces a phase transition following a period of inflation.
In addition to a classical treatment, characterized by the evolution of the field towards large expectation values, we quantize this field and observe the rapid amplification of the infrared perturbation modes. This observation carries intriguing consequences, particularly enabling the utilization of classical lattice simulations, a focal point in the subsequent phase of this project.
The attractiveness of this toy model lies in its independence from the specifics of the model of inflation and the energy scales at which the phase transition occurs.
Notably, a stochastic gravitational wave background created at an energy scale lower than that of inflation can more easily fall within the observable window of next-generation gravitational wave observatories.
