Power spectrum nulls due to nonstandard inflationary evolution

Abstract

The simplest models of inflation based on slow roll produce nearly scale invariant primordial power spectra (PPS). But there are also numerous models that predict radically broken scale invariant PPS. In particular, markedly cuspy dips in the PPS correspond to nulls where the perturbation amplitude, hence PPS, goes through a zero at a specific wave number. Near this wave number, the true quantum nature of the generation mechanism of the primordial fluctuations may be revealed. Naively these features may appear to arise from fine-tuned initial conditions. However, we show that this behavior arises under fairly generic set of conditions involving super-Hubble scale evolution of perturbation modes during inflation. We illustrate this with the well-studied examples of punctuated inflation and the Starobinsky-break model.