Newtonian limit of the singular f(R) gravity in the Palatini formalism

Recently D. Vollick [Phys. Rev. D68, 063510 (2003)] has shown that the inclusion of the 1/R curvature terms in the gravitational action and the use of the Palatini formalism offer an alternative explanation for cosmological acceleration. In this work we show not only that this model of Vollick does not have a good Newtonian limit, but also that any f(R) theory with a pole of order n in R=0 and its second derivative respect to R evaluated at Ro is not zero, where Ro is the scalar curvature of background, does not have a good Newtonian limit.Comment: 9 page

Supergravity Inflation on the Brane

We study N=1 Supergravity inflation in the context of the braneworld scenario. Particular attention is paid to the problem of the onset of inflation at sub-Planckian field values and the ensued inflationary observables. We find that the so-called $\eta$-problem encountered in supergravity inspired inflationary models can be solved in the context of the braneworld scenario, for some range of the parameters involved. Furthermore, we obtain an upper bound on the scale of the fifth dimension, M_5 \lsim 10^{-3} M_P, in case the inflationary potential is quadratic in the inflaton field, $\phi$. If the inflationary potential is cubic in $\phi$, consistency with observational data requires that $M_5 \simeq 9.2 \times 10^{-4} M_P$.Comment: 6 pages, 1 figure, to appear in Phys. Rev.

The CMB power spectrum at l=30-200 from QMASK

We measure the cosmic microwave background (CMB) power spectrum on angular scales l~30-200 (1-6 degrees) from the QMASK map, which combines the data from the QMAP and Saskatoon experiments. Since the accuracy of recent measurements leftward of the first acoustic peak is limited by sample-variance, the large area of the QMASK map (648 square degrees) allows us to place among the sharpest constraints to date in this range, in good agreement with BOOMERanG and (on the largest scales) COBE/DMR. By band-pass-filtering the QMAP and Saskatoon maps, we are able to spatially compare them scale-by-scale to check for beam- and pointing-related systematic errors.Comment: Revised to match accepted PRD version. Substantially expanded. Window functions, map and covariance matrix at http://www.hep.upenn.edu/~xuyz/qmask.htm

Acceleration of the universe, vacuum metamorphosis, and the large-time asymptotic form of the heat kernel

We investigate the possibility that the late acceleration observed in the rate of expansion of the universe is due to vacuum quantum effects arising in curved spacetime. The theoretical basis of the vacuum cold dark matter (VCDM), or vacuum metamorphosis, cosmological model of Parker and Raval is revisited and improved. We show, by means of a manifestly nonperturbative approach, how the infrared behavior of the propagator (related to the large-time asymptotic form of the heat kernel) of a free scalar field in curved spacetime causes the vacuum expectation value of its energy-momentum tensor to exhibit a resonance effect when the scalar curvature R of the spacetime reaches a particular value related to the mass of the field. we show that the back reaction caused by this resonance drives the universe through a transition to an accelerating expansion phase, very much in the same way as originally proposed by Parker and Raval. Our analysis includes higher derivatives that were neglected in the earlier analysis, and takes into account the possible runaway solutions that can follow from these higher-derivative terms. We find that the runaway solutions do not occur if the universe was described by the usual classical FRW solution prior to the growth of vacuum energy-density and negative pressure (i.e., vacuum metamorphosis) that causes the transition to an accelerating expansion of the universe in this theory.Comment: 33 pages, 3 figures. Submitted to Physical Review D15 (Dec 23, 2003). v2: 1 reference added. No other change

Gravitational Lensing and f(R) theories in the Palatini approach

We investigate gravitational lensing in the Palatini approach to the f(R) extended theories of gravity. Starting from an exact solution of the f(R) field equations, which corresponds to the Schwarzschild-de Sitter metric and, on the basis of recent studies on this metric, we focus on some lensing observables, in order to evaluate the effects of the non linearity of the gravity Lagrangian. We give estimates for some astrophysical events, and show that these effects are tiny for galactic lenses, but become interesting for extragalactic ones.Comment: 7 Pages, RevTex, 1 eps figure; references added; revised to match the version accepted for publication in General Relativity and Gravitatio

Probing Kaluza-Klein Dark Matter with Neutrino Telescopes

In models in which all of the Standard Model fields live in extra universal dimensions, the lightest Kaluza-Klein (KK) particle can be stable. Calculations of the one-loop radiative corrections to the masses of the KK modes suggest that the identity of the lightest KK particle (LKP) is mostly the first KK excitation of the hypercharge gauge boson. This LKP is a viable dark matter candidate with an ideal present-day relic abundance if its mass is moderately large, between 600 to 1200 GeV. Such weakly interacting dark matter particles are expected to become gravitationally trapped in large bodies, such as the Sun, and annihilate into neutrinos or other particles that decay into neutrinos. We calculate the annihilation rate, neutrino flux and the resulting event rate in present and future neutrino telescopes. The relatively large mass implies that the neutrino energy spectrum is expected to be well above the energy threshold of AMANDA and IceCube. We find that the event rate in IceCube is between a few to tens of events per year.Comment: 13 pages, 3 figures, LaTeX; typos fixed, version to appear in PR

Can inflationary models of cosmic perturbations evade the secondary oscillation test?

We consider the consequences of an observed Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) temperature anisotropy spectrum containing no secondary oscillations. While such a spectrum is generally considered to be a robust signature of active structure formation, we show that such a spectrum {\em can} be produced by (very unusual) inflationary models or other passive evolution models. However, we show that for all these passive models the characteristic oscillations would show up in other observable spectra. Our work shows that when CMB polarization and matter power spectra are taken into account secondary oscillations are indeed a signature of even these very exotic passive models. We construct a measure of the observability of secondary oscillations in a given experiment, and show that even with foregrounds both the MAP and \pk satellites should be able to distinguish between models with and without oscillations. Thus we conclude that inflationary and other passive models can {\em not} evade the secondary oscillation test.Comment: Final version accepted for publication in PRD. Minor improvements have been made to the discussion and new data has been included. The conclusions are unchagne

Phantom Field with O(N) Symmetry in Exponential Potential

In this paper, we study the phase space of phantom model with O(\emph{N}) symmetry in exponential potential. Different from the model without O(\emph{N}) symmetry, the introduction of the symmetry leads to a lower bound $w>-3$ on the equation of state for the existence of stable phantom dominated attractor phase. The reconstruction relation between the potential of O(\textit{N}) phantom system and red shift has been derived.Comment: 5 pages, 3 figures, replaced with the version to appear on Phys. Rev.

Primordial Nucleosynthesis as a Test of the Friedmann Equation in the Early Universe

In the standard hot big bang model, the expansion of the early universe is given by the Friedmann equation with an energy density dominated by relativistic particles. Since in a variety of models this equation is altered, we introduce modifications in the Friedmann equation and show that we can constrain them using big bang nucleosynthesis data. When there is no neutrino/antineutrino asymmetry these modifications are tightly bounded but in presence of an asymmetry the bounds become much looser. As an illustration, we apply our results to a model where the second and third families couple to gravity differently than the first family (non-universal gravity).Comment: 6 figures. Revised version. Matches with the accepted one for publication in PR