title: Extranatural inflation.
abstract: We present a new model of inflation in which the inflaton is the extra component of a gauge field in a 5D theory compactified on a circle. The chief merit of this model is that the potential comes only from nonlocal effects so that its flatness is not spoiled by higher-dimensional operators or quantum gravity corrections. The model predicts a red spectrum (n approximately 0.96) and a significant production of gravitational waves (r approximately 0.11). We also comment on the relevance of this idea to quintessence.
authors.affiliation: Jefferson Physical Laboratory, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02138, USA.
authors.forename: Nima
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Arkani-Hamed
authors.forename: Hsin-Chia
authors.initials: HC
authors.lastname: Cheng
authors.forename: Paolo
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Creminelli
authors.forename: Lisa
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Randall