Gauge field preheating at the end of inflation

Abstract

Here we consider the possibility of preheating the Universe via the parametric amplification of a massless, $U(1)$ Abelian gauge field. We assume that the gauge field is coupled to the inflaton via a dilaton-like coupling, a conformal factor with one free parameter. We present the results of high-resolution three-dimensional simulations of this model and show that this mechanism efficiently preheats the Universe to a radiation-dominated final state.