Tuning Locked Inflation: Supergravity versus Phenomenology

Abstract

We analyze the cosmological consequences of locked inflation, a model recently proposed by Dvali and Kachru that can produce significant amounts of inflation without requiring slow-roll. We pay particular attention to the end of inflation in this model, showing that a secondary phase of saddle inflation can follow the locked inflationary era. However, this subsequent period of inflation results in a strongly scale dependent spectrum that can lead to massive black hole formation in the primordial universe. Avoiding this disastrous outcome puts strong constraints on the parameter space open to models of locked inflation.