Polycritical Gravities

We present higher-derivative gravities that propagate an arbitrary number of gravitons of different mass on (A)dS backgrounds. These theories have multiple critical points, at which the masses degenerate and the graviton energies are non-negative. For six derivatives and higher there are critical points with positive energy.Comment: Version to be publishe

On quasi-local Hamiltonians in General Relativity

We analyse the definition of quasi-local energy in GR based on a Hamiltonian analysis of the Einstein-Hilbert action initiated by Brown-York. The role of the constraint equations, in particular the Hamiltonian constraint on the timelike boundary, neglected in previous studies, is emphasized here. We argue that a consistent definition of quasi-local energy in GR requires, at a minimum, a framework based on the (currently unknown) geometric well-posedness of the initial boundary value problem for the Einstein equations.Comment: 9 page

Dynamical evolution of scalar perturbation in Ho\v{r}ava-Lifshitz black-hole spacetimes

We study the dynamical evolution of a massless scalar perturbation in the Ho\v{r}ava-Lifshitz black-hole spacetimes with the coupling constants $\lambda={1/3}$, $\lambda={1/2}$ and $\lambda=3$, respectively. Our calculation shows that, for the three cases, the scalar perturbations decay without any oscillation in which the decay rate imprints the parameter of the Ho\v{r}ava-Lifshitz black hole. The results are quite different from those in the Schwarzschild AdS black hole and can help us understand more about the Ho\v{r}ava-Lifshitz gravity.Comment: 14 pages, 5 figure

Remarks on the consistency of minimal deviations from General Relativity

We study the consequences of the modification of the phase space structure of General Relativity imposed by breaking the full diffeomorphism invariance but retaining the time foliation preserving diffeomorphisms. We examine the different sectors in phase space that satisfy the new structure of constraints. For some sectors we find an infinite tower of constraints. In spite of that, we also show that these sectors allow for solutions, among them some well known families of black hole and cosmologies which fulfill all the constraints. We raise some physical concerns on the consequences of an absolute Galilean time, on the thermodynamical pathologies of such models and on their unusual vacuum structure.Comment: latex 28 pages, 1 figure. Added comments and a reference. Text improved

Gravitational GUT Breaking and the GUT-Planck Hierarchy

It is shown that non-renormalizable gravitational interactions in the Higgs sector of supersymmetric grand unified theories (GUT's) can produce the breaking of the unifying gauge group $G$ at the GUT scale $M_{\rm GUT} \sim 10^{16}$~GeV. Such a breaking offers an attractive alternative to the traditional method where the superheavy GUT scale mass parameters are added ad hoc into the theory. The mechanism also offers a natural explanation for the closeness of the GUT breaking scale to the Planck scale. A study of the minimal SU(5) model endowed with this mechanism is presented and shown to be phenomenologically viable. A second model is examined where the Higgs doublets are kept naturally light as Goldstone modes. This latter model also achieves breaking of $G$ at $M_{\rm GUT}$ but cannot easily satisfy the current experimental proton decay bound.Comment: 11 pages, REVTeX, 1 figure included as an uuencoded Z-compressed PostScript file. Our Web page at http://physics.tamu.edu/~urano/research/gutplanck.html contains ready to print PostScript version (with figures) as well as color version of plot

{\delta}N formalism

Precise understanding of nonlinear evolution of cosmological perturbations during inflation is necessary for the correct interpretation of measurements of non-Gaussian correlations in the cosmic microwave background and the large-scale structure of the universe. The "{\delta}N formalism" is a popular and powerful technique for computing non-linear evolution of cosmological perturbations on large scales. In particular, it enables us to compute the curvature perturbation, {\zeta}, on large scales without actually solving perturbed field equations. However, people often wonder why this is the case. In order for this approach to be valid, the perturbed Hamiltonian constraint and matter-field equations on large scales must, with a suitable choice of coordinates, take on the same forms as the corresponding unperturbed equations. We find that this is possible when (1) the unperturbed metric is given by a homogeneous and isotropic Friedmann-Lema\^itre-Robertson-Walker metric; and (2) on large scales and with a suitable choice of coordinates, one can ignore the shift vector (g0i) as well as time-dependence of tensor perturbations to gij/a2(t) of the perturbed metric. While the first condition has to be assumed a priori, the second condition can be met when (3) the anisotropic stress becomes negligible on large scales. However, in order to explicitly show that the second condition follows from the third condition, one has to use gravitational field equations, and thus this statement may depend on the details of theory of gravitation. Finally, as the {\delta}N formalism uses only the Hamiltonian constraint and matter-field equations, it does not a priori respect the momentum constraint. We show that the violation of the momentum constraint only yields a decaying mode solution for {\zeta}, and the violation vanishes when the slow-roll conditions are satisfied.Comment: 10 page

Extreme throat initial data set and horizon area--angular momentum inequality for axisymmetric black holes

We present a formula that relates the variations of the area of extreme throat initial data with the variation of an appropriate defined mass functional. From this expression we deduce that the first variation, with fixed angular momentum, of the area is zero and the second variation is positive definite evaluated at the extreme Kerr throat initial data. This indicates that the area of the extreme Kerr throat initial data is a minimum among this class of data. And hence the area of generic throat initial data is bounded from below by the angular momentum. Also, this result strongly suggests that the inequality between area and angular momentum holds for generic asymptotically flat axially symmetric black holes. As an application, we prove this inequality in the non trivial family of spinning Bowen-York initial data.Comment: 11 pages. Changes in presentation and typos correction