From heaviness to lightness during inflation

From heaviness to lightness during inflation

We study the quantum fluctuations of scalar fields with a variable effective mass during an inflationary phase. We consider the situation where the effective mass depends on a background scalar field, which evolves during inflation from being frozen into a damped oscillatory phase when the Hubble parameter decreases below its mass. We find power spectra with suppressed amplitude on large scales...

Lightness, Heaviness and Gravity

Lightness, heaviness and gravity

From Inflation to More Inflation, Disinflation and Low Inflation

Seeing Heaviness

Participants watched a recording of the motions produced when another person wielded a pendulum. The participants’ task was to judge the heaviness of the pendulum. We found that participants were similarly adept at judging the pendulum’s heaviness as when participants wield the pendulum themselves and perceive heaviness haptically. It is hypothesized that people are able to make these visual he...