Inflation and pseudo-Goldstone Higgs boson
  We consider inflation within a model framework where the Higgs boson arises
as a pseudo-Goldstone boson associated with the breaking of a global symmetry
at a scale significantly larger than the electroweak one. We show that in such
a model the scalar self-couplings can be parametrically suppressed and,
consequently, the non-minimal couplings to gravity can be of order one or less,
while the inflationary predictions of the model remain compatible with the
precision cosmological observations. Furthermore, in the model we study, the
existence of the electroweak scale is entirely due to the inflaton field. Our
model therefore suggests that inflation and low energy particle phenomenology
may be more entwined than assumed so far.
