Exploring trans-Planckian physics and the curvature effect by primordial power spectrum with WMAP five-year data

Abstract

The vacuum inflation with a boundary condition specified at a short-distance scale in a generally primeval non-flat Universe, and implications of the correspondingly modified primordial power spectrum via the WMAP data are investigated. We obtain a general form of the modified primordial power spectrum including the effects of both possibly new physics scale and the spatial curvature. The modulation of the primordial power spectrum due to new physics is of the order $H/\Lambda$, where $H$ is the Hubble parameter during inflation and $\Lambda$ is the new physics scale that is key to inflation, while the modulation from the curvature effect is of the order $K/k^2$, where $K$ is the spatial curvature before inflation and $k$ is the comoving wave number. We also find that a closed Universe before inflation is favored by WMAP five-year data.