Modulated Natural Inflation

Abstract

We discuss some model-independent implications of embedding (aligned) axionic inflation in string theory. As a consequence of string theoretic duality symmetries the pure cosine potentials of natural inflation are replaced by modular functions. This leads to "wiggles" in the inflationary potential that modify the predictions with respect to CMB-observations. In particular, the scalar power spectrum deviates from the standard power law form. As a by-product one can show that trans-Planckian excursions of the aligned effective axion are compatible with the weak gravity conjecture.