Reheating with Thermal Dissipation and Primordial Gravitational Waves

Abstract

In order for an inflationary universe to evolve into a hot universe, a process known as reheating is required. However, the precise mechanism of reheating remains unknown. We show that if the reheating is triggered by thermal dissipation effects, distinctive features appear in the spectrum of primordial gravitational waves. This suggests a possible way to observationally probe the physics of reheating.