In theory, Inflation started at $10^{-36}$ seconds after the Big Bang and ended at $10^{-32}$ seconds. But let's imagine Inflation had lasted one second instead. In theory how much bigger would that make the known universe?
1 Answers
The length of the inflationary epoch isn't known. When people say that inflation ended $10^{-32}\text{ s}$ "after the big bang", they really mean that the $e$-folding time (the time for the scale factor to increase linearly by a factor of $e$) is roughly that. Inflation has to last for at least 50-60 $e$-folds, so it actually has to last much longer than the time "after the big bang" at which it ends. See this answer for more details, including an explanation of where this funny convention comes from.
If the $e$-fold time is $10^{-32}\text{ s}$, then for each additional second that inflation lasts, the volume of the universe increases by another factor of
$$\left( e^{10^{32}} \right)^3 \approx 10^{100000000000000000000000000000000}.$$
That seems ridiculous, but many things about the world we live in seem ridiculous, so who knows.
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