Large Scale Structure Forecast Constraints on Particle Production During Inflation

Abstract: Bursts of particle production during inflation provide a well-motivated mechanism for creating bump like features in the primordial power spectrum. Current data constrains these features to be less than about 5% the size of the featureless primordial power spectrum at wavenumbers of about 0.1 h Mpc^{-1}. We forecast that the Planck cosmic microwave background experiment will be able to strengthen this constraint to the 0.5% level. We also predict that adding data from a square kilometer array (SKA) galaxy redshift survey would improve the constraint to about the 0.1% level. For features at larger wave-numbers, Planck will be limited by Silk damping and foregrounds. While, SKA will be limited by non-linear effects. We forecast for a Cosmic Inflation Probe (CIP) galaxy redshift survey, similar constraints can be achieved up to about a wavenumber of 1 h Mpc^{-1}.