Inflation in supersymmetric cosmic string theories

We examine a non-Abelian SUSY SU(2) X U(1) gauge theory and a SUSY U(1) the ory originally used to investigate the microphysics of cosmic strings in su persymmetric theories. Such theories arise naturally in grand unified theor ies. We show that both theories automatically include hybrid inflation. In the latter theory we use a D term to break the symmetry. SUSY is broken dur ing inflation and restored afterwards. Cosmic strings are formed at the end of inflation. The temperature anisotropy is calculated and found to vary a s (M-GUT/M-P)(2). (C) 1999 Published by Elsevier Science B.V. All rights re served.