Talks

Universality classes of inflation as phases of condensed matter: slow-roll, solids, gaugids etc.
Abstract: Cosmology and condensed matter systems share the same basic symmetries: both are characterised by a (spontaneous) breaking of Lorentz boosts and by approximate translation and rotation invariances. It is therefore not completely surprising that the basic mechanisms for cosmic acceleration be in one to one correspondence with different condensed matter realisations. This point of view has recently unveiled inflationary models well beyond single-field inflation. The different inequivalent ways in which translation and rotation invariance can be recovered at low energy lead to different "universality classes” for cosmic acceleration. Among those, solid inflation and the recently proposed gaugid inflation have substantially different properties than those of single-field slow-roll scenarios.