Extending Starobinsky inflationary model in gravity and supergravity

Understand

We review some recent trends in the inflationary model building, the supersymmetry (SUSY) breaking, the gravitino Dark Matter (DM) and the Primordial Black Holes (PBHs) production in supergravity.

• The Starobinsky inflation can be embedded into supergravity when the inflaton belongs to the massive vector multiplet associated with a (spontaneously broken) $U(1)$ gauge symmetry.
• The SUSY and R-symmetry can be also spontaneously broken after inflation by the (standard) Polonyi mechanism.
• Polonyi particles and gravitinos are super heavy and can be copiously produced during inflation via the Schwinger mechanism sourced by the Universe expansion.