Perturbative analysis of the reheating dynamics of α-attractors

In this paper, we study the reheating phase following inflation in the context of single-field models, focusing on the perturbative decay of the inflaton into lighter particles. A general analytical framework is presented to compute the reheating temperature [Formula: see text] and related quantities by combining cosmological observations with model-dependent parameters. We derive expressions for [Formula: see text] for three types of interactions: gravitational, scalar and Yukawa-type fermionic couplings, and apply these results to the class of [Formula: see text]-attractor inflationary models, which exhibit attractor behavior in the [Formula: see text] plane. The main goal of this work is to investigate how key cosmological quantities such as [Formula: see text], [Formula: see text] and [Formula: see text] among others, evolve with the scalar spectral index [Formula: see text] and the Yukawa coupling constant y, within a consistent analytical framework. Although the formulas used are approximate, they are sufficient to capture the qualitative behavior of the relevant quantities across a wide range of parameter values. Here, we are not interested in precise numerical approximations or data analysis, but rather in understanding the general trends and dependence of cosmological quantities of interest. In particular, tendencies observed in the figures, such as the sensitivity of [Formula: see text] to the coupling strength and the equation-of-state parameter [Formula: see text], reflect physical features that are not strongly affected by the approximations involved.