| Abstract: |
Axions, scalar fields with compact field spaces, are some of the most well-motivated candidates for physics beyond the Standard Model. In this talk, I will explain how inflationary correlations are uniquely sensitive to the topology of a scalar's field space, and can thus be used to distinguish axions from other light scalar fields. I will discuss a new inflationary detection channel for pre-inflationary axions and show that they can lead to a qualitatively different shape of the bispectrum, and therefore enable a measurement of their decay constant using galaxy clustering data. Along the way, I will highlight some progress in our understanding of loop effects in de Sitter.
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