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Planck constraints on inflation in auxiliary vector modified $f(R)$ theories

We show that the universal $α$-attractor models of inflation can be realized by including an auxiliary vector field $A_μ$ for the Starobinsky model with the Lagrangian $f(R)=R+R^2/(6M^2)$. If the same procedure is applied to general modified $f(R)$ theories in which the Ricci scalar $R$ is replaced by $R+A_μ A^μ+β\nabla_μA^μ$ with constant $β$, we obtain the Brans-Dicke theory with a scalar potential and the Brans-Dicke parameter $ω_{\rm BD}=β^2/4$. We also place observational constraints on inflationary models based on auxiliary vector modified $f(R)$ theories from the latest Planck measurements of the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) anisotropies in both temperature and polarization. In the modified Starobinsky model, we find that the parameter $β$ is constrained to be $β<25$ (68\,\%\,confidence level) from the bounds of the scalar spectral index and the tensor-to-scalar ratio.