Figure 3

Figure 3: The complete evolution of w (N ), from the flow-equation results accepted by the CMB likelihood. Inflation is made to end at N = 0 where w(N = 0) = − 1∕3 corresponding to 𝜖H (N = 0) = 1. For our choice of priors on the slow-roll parameters at N = 0, we find that w decreases rapidly towards − 1 (see inset) and stays close to it during the period when the observable scales leave the horizon (N ≈ 40 –60). Image reproduced by permission from [475]; copyright by APS.