Noncanonical warm inflation with nonminimal derivative coupling

Abstract

This study extended noncanonical warm inflation to the nonminimal derivative coupling scenario. The fundamental equations, including the evolution equations and the slow roll equations of this new framework, were derived. The enlarged damping term, which encompasses both gravitationally enhanced friction and thermal damping, resulted in a well overdamped inflationary process, ensuring that the slow roll approximations can be satisfactorily satisfied. A linear stability analysis corroborated the viability of this approach, yielding significantly relaxed slow roll conditions within the context of noncanonical warm inflation with nonminimal derivative coupling. Subsequently, the density fluctuations in this new framework were analyzed, leading to approximately analytic results for the power spectrum, spectral index, and related quantities. Both the energy scale at horizon crossing and the tensor-to-scalar ratio decreased considerably because of the effects of thermal damping and nonminimal derivative coupling. The upper bound for field excursion remained safely sub-Planckian in this inflationary scenario. Thus we reached a successful and meaningful model to broad the scope of warm inflation.