Dark energy due to quantum corrections to effective potential

Abstract

In this paper we calculate quantum corrections to the effective potential in different models of inflationary cosmology. We show that quantum corrections lead to a modification of the initial potential uplifting its value at the minimum, which can be interpreted as a cosmological constant/dark energy. We concentrate on the models of $\alpha$-attractors and show that one can naturally get small values of the cosmological constant. In the model of quintessence, the same mechanism modifies the value of dark energy at the present time.