3,894 research outputs found
The Seeds of Cosmic structure as a door to New Physics
There is something missing in our understanding of the origin of the seeds of
Cosmic Structuture.
The fact that the fluctuation spectrum can be extracted from the inflationary
scenario through an analysis that involves quantum field theory in curved
space-time, and that it coincides with the observational data has lead to a
certain complacency in the community, which prevents the critical analysis of
the obscure spots in the derivation. The point is that the inhomogeneity and
anisotropy of our universe seem to emerge from an exactly homogeneous and
isotropic initial state through processes that do not break those symmetries.
This article gives a brief recount of the problems faced by the arguments based
on established physics, which comprise the point of view held by a large
majority of researchers in the field.
The conclusion is that we need some new physics to be able to fully address
the problem. The article then exposes one avenue that has been used to address
the central issue and elaborates on the degree to which, the new approach makes
different predictions from the standard analyses.
The approach is inspired on Penrose's proposals that Quantum Gravity might
lead to a real, dynamical collapse of the wave function, a process that we
argue has the properties needed to extract us from the theoretical impasse
described above.Comment: Prepared for the proceedings of the conference NEBXII " Recent
Developments in Gravity", Napfio Grece June 2006. LateX, 15 page
Interpreting doubly special relativity as a modified theory of measurement
In this article we develop a physical interpretation for the deformed
(doubly) special relativity theories (DSRs), based on a modification of the
theory of measurement in special relativity. We suggest that it is useful to
regard the DSRs as reflecting the manner in which quantum gravity effects
induce Planck-suppressed distortions in the measurement of the "true" energy
and momentum. This interpretation provides a framework for the DSRs that is
manifestly consistent, non-trivial, and in principle falsifiable. However, it
does so at the cost of demoting such theories from the level of "fundamental"
physics to the level of phenomenological models -- models that should in
principle be derivable from whatever theory of quantum gravity one ultimately
chooses to adopt.Comment: 18 pages, plain LaTeX2
Radiation generated by accelerating and rotating charged black holes in (anti-)de Sitter space
Asymptotic behaviour of gravitational and electromagnetic fields of exact
type D solutions from the large Plebanski-Demianski family of black hole
spacetimes is analyzed. The amplitude and directional structure of radiation is
evaluated in cases when the cosmological constant is non-vanishing, so that the
conformal infinities have either de Sitter-like or anti-de Sitter-like
character. In particular, explicit relations between the parameters that
characterize the sources (that is their mass, electric and magnetic charges,
NUT parameter, rotational parameter, and acceleration) and properties of the
radiation generated by them are presented. The results further elucidate the
physical interpretation of these solutions and may help to understand radiative
characteristics of more general spacetimes than those that are asymptotically
flat.Comment: 24 pages, 18 figures. To appear in Classical and Quantum Gravit
Degeneracy measures for the algebraic classification of numerical spacetimes
We study the issue of algebraic classification of the Weyl curvature tensor,
with a particular focus on numerical relativity simulations. The spacetimes of
interest in this context, binary black hole mergers, and the ringdowns that
follow them, present subtleties in that they are generically, strictly
speaking, Type I, but in many regions approximately, in some sense, Type D. To
provide meaning to any claims of "approximate" Petrov class, one must define a
measure of degeneracy on the space of null rays at a point. We will investigate
such a measure, used recently to argue that certain binary black hole merger
simulations ring down to the Kerr geometry, after hanging up for some time in
Petrov Type II. In particular, we argue that this hangup in Petrov Type II is
an artefact of the particular measure being used, and that a geometrically
better-motivated measure shows a black hole merger produced by our group
settling directly to Petrov Type D.Comment: 14 pages, 7 figures. Version 2 adds two references
Decoherence of Macroscopic Closed Systems within Newtonian Quantum Gravity
A theory recently proposed by the author aims to explain decoherence and the
thermodynamical behaviour of closed systems within a conservative, unitary,
framework for quantum gravity by assuming that the operators tied to the
gravitational degrees of freedom are unobservable and equating physical entropy
with matter-gravity entanglement entropy. Here we obtain preliminary results on
the extent of decoherence this theory predicts. We treat first a static state
which, if one were to ignore quantum gravitational effects, would be a quantum
superposition of two spatially displaced states of a single classically well
describable ball of uniform mass density in empty space. Estimating the quantum
gravitational effects on this system within a simple Newtonian approximation,
we obtain formulae which predict e.g. that as long as the mass of the ball is
considerably larger than the Planck mass, such a would-be-coherent static
superposition will actually be decohered whenever the separation of the centres
of mass of the two ball-states excedes a small fraction (which decreases as the
mass of the ball increases) of the ball radius. We then obtain a formula for
the quantum gravitational correction to the would-be-pure density matrix of a
non-relativistic many-body Schroedinger wave function and argue that this
formula predicts decoherence between configurations which differ (at least) in
the "relocation" of a cluster of particles of Planck mass. We estimate the
entropy of some simple model closed systems, finding a tendency for it to
increase with "matter-clumping" suggestive of a link with existing
phenomenological discussions of cosmological entropy increase.Comment: 11 pages, plain TeX, no figures. Accepted for publication as a
"Letter to the Editor" in "Classical and Quantum Gravity
The Stability of an Isotropic Cosmological Singularity in Higher-Order Gravity
We study the stability of the isotropic vacuum Friedmann universe in gravity
theories with higher-order curvature terms of the form
added to the Einstein-Hilbert Lagrangian of general relativity on approach to
an initial cosmological singularity. Earlier, we had shown that, when ,
a special isotropic vacuum solution exists which behaves like the
radiation-dominated Friedmann universe and is stable to anisotropic and small
inhomogeneous perturbations of scalar, vector and tensor type. This is
completely different to the situation that holds in general relativity, where
an isotropic initial cosmological singularity is unstable in vacuum and under a
wide range of non-vacuum conditions. We show that when , although a
special isotropic vacuum solution found by Clifton and Barrow always exists, it
is no longer stable when the initial singularity is approached. We find the
particular stability conditions under the influence of tensor, vector, and
scalar perturbations for general for both solution branches. On approach to
the initial singularity, the isotropic vacuum solution with scale factor
is found to be stable to tensor perturbations for and stable to vector perturbations for , but is
unstable as otherwise. The solution with scale factor
is not relevant to the case of an initial singularity for
and is unstable as for all for each type of perturbation.Comment: 25 page
Stable Isotropic Cosmological Singularities in Quadratic Gravity
We show that, in quadratic lagrangian theories of gravity, isotropic
cosmological singularities are stable to the presence of small scalar, vector
and tensor inhomogeneities. Unlike in general relativity, a particular exact
isotropic solution is shown to be the stable attractor on approach to the
initial cosmological singularity. This solution is also known to act as an
attractor in Bianchi universes of types I, II and IX, and the results of this
paper reinforce the hypothesis that small inhomogeneous and anisotropic
perturbations of this attractor form part of the general cosmological solution
to the field equations of quadratic gravity. Implications for the existence of
a 'gravitational entropy' are also discussed.Comment: 18 pages, no figure
Accelerated sources in de Sitter spacetime and the insufficiency of retarded fields
The scalar and electromagnetic fields produced by the geodesic and uniformly
accelerated discrete charges in de Sitter spacetime are constructed by
employing the conformal relation between de Sitter and Minkowski space.
A special attention is paid to new effects arising in spacetimes which, like
de Sitter space, have spacelike conformal infinities. Under the presence of
particle and event horizons, purely retarded fields (appropriately defined)
become necessarily singular or even cannot be constructed at the "creation
light cones" -- future light cones of the "points" at which the sources "enter"
the universe. We construct smooth (outside the sources) fields involving both
retarded and advanced effects, and analyze the fields in detail in case of (i)
scalar monopoles, (ii) electromagnetic monopoles, and (iii) electromagnetic
rigid and geodesic dipoles.Comment: 36 pages, 5 figures, LaTex2e; minor misprints corrected, one
reference added and some terminology change
The collision and snapping of cosmic strings generating spherical impulsive gravitational waves
The Penrose method for constructing spherical impulsive gravitational waves
is investigated in detail, including alternative spatial sections and an
arbitrary cosmological constant. The resulting waves include those that are
generated by a snapping cosmic string. The method is used to construct an
explicit exact solution of Einstein's equations describing the collision of two
nonaligned cosmic strings in a Minkowski background which snap at their point
of collision.Comment: 10 pages, 6 figures, To appear in Class. Quantum Gra
Persistence of black holes through a cosmological bounce
We discuss whether black holes could persist in a universe which recollapses
and then bounces into a new expansion phase. Whether the bounce is of classical
or quantum gravitational origin, such cosmological models are of great current
interest. In particular, we investigate the mass range in which black holes
might survive a bounce and ways of differentiating observationally between
black holes formed just after and just before the last bounce. We also discuss
the consequences of the universe going through a sequence of dimensional
changes as it passes through a bounce.Comment: 8 pages, 1 figur
- …