Constraining Modified Mass-to-Horizon Cosmology Through Primordial Inflationary Observables
Abstract
We investigate slow-roll inflation in a modified cosmological framework inspired by a generalized mass-to-horizon relation (MHR), M=γc2 Ln/G, where n is a real parameter and γ a dimensional constant. Using Padmanabhan's emergence paradigm, we derive the modified Friedmann equations for a flat FRW universe and analyze the dynamics of a canonical scalar field (inflaton) under the slow-roll approximation. We study the resulting inflationary phenomenology for power-law and Starobinsky potentials. For power-law potentials, the MHR modification fails to reconcile these models with current CMB constraints on r and ns. In contrast, Starobinsky inflation exhibits significant sensitivity to deviations from n=1. A perturbative analysis (n=1+Δ) yields corrections to inflationary observables. We observe that the scalar power-spectrum normalization, under a fixed-Starobinsky prescription, imposes the stringent constraint 0.960 ≲ n ≲ 1.040 for N=60 efolds. This is considerably tighter than spectral-index bounds. Our results establish inflation, particularly Starobinsky-like models, as a sensitive probe of generalized horizon thermodynamics and departures from standard MHR scaling.
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BibTeX
@misc{sheykhi2026constraining,
title = {{Constraining Modified Mass-to-Horizon Cosmology Through Primordial Inflationary Observables}},
author = {A. Sheykhi and G. G. Luciano and A. Benkrane},
howpublished = {arXiv},
year = {2026},
month = sep,
doi = {10.48550/arxiv.2609.11221},
eprint = {2609.11221},
archivePrefix = {arXiv},
url = {https://arxiv.org/abs/2609.11221},
note = {CC BY 4.0},
}
RIS
TY - UNPB
TI - Constraining Modified Mass-to-Horizon Cosmology Through Primordial Inflationary Observables
AU - A. Sheykhi
AU - G. G. Luciano
AU - A. Benkrane
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/09/10
PB - arXiv
DO - 10.48550/arxiv.2609.11221
UR - https://arxiv.org/abs/2609.11221
AB - We investigate slow-roll inflation in a modified cosmological framework inspired by a generalized mass-to-horizon relation (MHR), M=γc^2 L^n/G, where n is a real parameter and γ a dimensional constant. Using Padmanabhan's emergence paradigm, we derive the modified Friedmann equations for a flat FRW universe and analyze the dynamics of a canonical scalar field (inflaton) under the slow-roll approximation. We study the resulting inflationary phenomenology for power-law and Starobinsky potentials. For power-law potentials, the MHR modification fails to reconcile these models with current CMB constraints on r and n_s. In contrast, Starobinsky inflation exhibits significant sensitivity to deviations from n=1. A perturbative analysis (n=1+Δ) yields corrections to inflationary observables. We observe that the scalar power-spectrum normalization, under a fixed-Starobinsky prescription, imposes the stringent constraint 0.960 ≲ n ≲ 1.040 for N=60 efolds. This is considerably tighter than spectral-index bounds. Our results establish inflation, particularly Starobinsky-like models, as a sensitive probe of generalized horizon thermodynamics and departures from standard MHR scaling.
ER -