Effective field theory and decoupling in multifield inflation: An illustrative case study

Abstract

We explore the effects of heavy degrees of freedom on the evolution and perturbations of light modes in multifield inflation. We use a simple two-field model as an example to illustrate the subtleties of integrating out massive fields in a time-dependent background. We show that when adiabaticity is violated due to a sharp turn in field space, the roles of massive and massless field are interchanged, and furthermore the fields are strongly coupled; thus the system cannot be described by an effective single-field action. Further analysis shows that the sharp turn imparts a non-Bunch-Davis component in each perturbation mode, leading to oscillatory features in the power spectrum, and a large resonantly enhanced bispectrum.