2,331 research outputs found
Massive Cosmologies
We explore the cosmological solutions of a recently proposed extension of
General Relativity with a Lorentz-invariant mass term. We show that the same
constraint that removes the Boulware-Deser ghost in this theory also prohibits
the existence of homogeneous and isotropic cosmological solutions.
Nevertheless, within domains of the size of inverse graviton mass we find
approximately homogeneous and isotropic solutions that can well describe the
past and present of the Universe. At energy densities above a certain crossover
value, these solutions approximate the standard FRW evolution with great
accuracy. As the Universe evolves and density drops below the crossover value
the inhomogeneities become more and more pronounced. In the low density regime
each domain of the size of the inverse graviton mass has essentially non-FRW
cosmology. This scenario imposes an upper bound on the graviton mass, which we
roughly estimate to be an order of magnitude below the present-day value of the
Hubble parameter. The bound becomes especially restrictive if one utilizes an
exact self-accelerated solution that this theory offers. Although the above are
robust predictions of massive gravity with an explicit mass term, we point out
that if the mass parameter emerges from some additional scalar field
condensation, the constraint no longer forbids the homogeneous and isotropic
cosmologies. In the latter case, there will exist an extra light scalar field
at cosmological scales, which is screened by the Vainshtein mechanism at
shorter distances.Comment: 21 page
Actively Learning Reinforcement Learning: A Stochastic Optimal Control Approach
In this paper we provide a framework to cope with two problems: (i) the
fragility of reinforcement learning due to modeling uncertainties because of
the mismatch between controlled laboratory/simulation and real-world conditions
and (ii) the prohibitive computational cost of stochastic optimal control. We
approach both problems by using reinforcement learning to solve the stochastic
dynamic programming equation. The resulting reinforcement learning controller
is safe with respect to several types of constraints and it can actively learn
about the modeling uncertainties. Unlike exploration and exploitation, probing
and safety are employed automatically by the controller itself, resulting
real-time learning. A simulation example demonstrates the efficacy of the
proposed approach
Scaling Solutions to 6D Gauged Chiral Supergravity
We construct explicitly time-dependent exact solutions to the field equations
of 6D gauged chiral supergravity, compactified to 4D in the presence of up to
two 3-branes situated within the extra dimensions. The solutions we find are
scaling solutions, and are plausibly attractors which represent the late-time
evolution of a broad class of initial conditions. By matching their near-brane
boundary conditions to physical brane properties we argue that these solutions
(together with the known maximally-symmetric solutions and a new class of
non-Lorentz-invariant static solutions, which we also present here) describe
the bulk geometry between a pair of 3-branes with non-trivial on-brane
equations of state.Comment: Contribution to the New Journal of Physics focus issue on Dark
Energy; 28 page
Stochastic Inflation Revisited: Non-Slow Roll Statistics and DBI Inflation
Stochastic inflation describes the global structure of the inflationary
universe by modeling the super-Hubble dynamics as a system of matter fields
coupled to gravity where the sub-Hubble field fluctuations induce a stochastic
force into the equations of motion. The super-Hubble dynamics are ultralocal,
allowing us to neglect spatial derivatives and treat each Hubble patch as a
separate universe. This provides a natural framework in which to discuss
probabilities on the space of solutions and initial conditions. In this article
we derive an evolution equation for this probability for an arbitrary class of
matter systems, including DBI and k-inflationary models, and discover
equilibrium solutions that satisfy detailed balance. Our results are more
general than those derived assuming slow roll or a quasi-de Sitter geometry,
and so are directly applicable to models that do not satisfy the usual slow
roll conditions. We discuss in general terms the conditions for eternal
inflation to set in, and we give explicit numerical solutions of highly
stochastic, quasi-stationary trajectories in the relativistic DBI regime.
Finally, we show that the probability for stochastic/thermal tunneling can be
significantly enhanced relative to the Hawking-Moss instanton result due to
relativistic DBI effects.Comment: 38 pages, 2 figures. v3: minor revisions; version accepted into JCA
Long-term feeding ecology and habitat use in harbour porpoises <i>Phocoena phocoena</i> from Scandinavian waters inferred from trace elements and stable isotopes
Background. We investigated the feeding ecology and habitat use of 32 harbour porpoises by-caught in 4 localities along the Scandinavian coast from the North Sea to the Barents Sea using time-integrative markers: stable isotopes (δ13C, δ15N) and trace elements (Zn, Cu, Fe, Se, total Hg and Cd), in relation to habitat characteristics (bathymetry) and geographic position (latitude). Results. Among the trace elements analysed, only Cd, with an oceanic specific food origin, was found to be useful as an ecological tracer. All other trace elements studied were not useful, most likely because of physiological regulation and/or few specific sources in the food web. The δ13C, δ15N signatures and Cd levels were highly correlated with each other, as well as with local bathymetry and geographic position (latitude). Variation in the isotopic ratios indicated a shift in harbour porpoise's feeding habits from pelagic prey species in deep northern waters to more coastal and/or demersal prey in the relatively shallow North Sea and Skagerrak waters. This result is consistent with stomach content analyses found in the literature. This shift was associated with a northward Cd-enrichment which provides further support to the Cd 'anomaly' previously reported in polar waters and suggests that porpoises in deep northern waters include Cd-contaminated prey in their diet, such as oceanic cephalopods. Conclusion. As stable isotopes and Cd provide information in the medium and the long term respectively, the spatial variation found, shows that harbour porpoises experience different ecological regimes during the year along the Scandinavian coasts, adapting their feeding habits to local oceanographic conditions, without performing extensive migration
Kicking the Rugby Ball: Perturbations of 6D Gauged Chiral Supergravity
We analyze the axially-symmetric scalar perturbations of 6D chiral gauged
supergravity compactified on the general warped geometries in the presence of
two source branes. We find all of the conical geometries are marginally stable
for normalizable perturbations (in disagreement with some recent calculations)
and the nonconical for regular perturbations, even though none of them are
supersymmetric (apart from the trivial Salam-Sezgin solution, for which there
are no source branes). The marginal direction is the one whose presence is
required by the classical scaling property of the field equations, and all
other modes have positive squared mass. In the special case of the conical
solutions, including (but not restricted to) the unwarped `rugby-ball'
solutions, we find closed-form expressions for the mode functions in terms of
Legendre and Hypergeometric functions. In so doing we show how to match the
asymptotic near-brane form for the solution to the physics of the source
branes, and thereby how to physically interpret perturbations which can be
singular at the brane positions.Comment: 21 pages + appendices, references adde
Unitary evolution of free massless fields in de Sitter space-time
We consider the quantum dynamics of a massless scalar field in de Sitter
space-time. The classical evolution is represented by a canonical
transformation on the phase space for the field theory. By studying the
corresponding Bogoliubov transformations, we show that the symplectic map that
encodes the evolution between two instants of time cannot be unitarily
implemented on any Fock space built from a SO(4)-symmetric complex structure.
We will show also that, in contrast with some effectively lower dimensional
examples arising from Quantum General Relativity such as Gowdy models, it is
impossible to find a time dependent conformal redefinition of the massless
scalar field leading to a quantum unitary dynamics.Comment: 20 pages. Comments and references adde
On the divergences of inflationary superhorizon perturbations
We discuss the infrared divergences that appear to plague cosmological
perturbation theory. We show that within the stochastic framework they are
regulated by eternal inflation so that the theory predicts finite fluctuations.
Using the formalism to one loop, we demonstrate that the infrared
modes can be absorbed into additive constants and the coefficients of the
diagrammatic expansion for the connected parts of two and three-point functions
of the curvature perturbation. As a result, the use of any infrared cutoff
below the scale of eternal inflation is permitted, provided that the background
fields are appropriately redefined. The natural choice for the infrared cutoff
would of course be the present horizon; other choices manifest themselves in
the running of the correlators. We also demonstrate that it is possible to
define observables that are renormalization group invariant. As an example, we
derive a non-perturbative, infrared finite and renormalization point
independent relation between the two-point correlators of the curvature
perturbation for the case of the free single field.Comment: 12 page
Brane cosmological solutions in six-dimensional warped flux compactifications
We study cosmology on a conical brane in the six-dimensional
Einstein-Maxwell-dilaton system, where the extra dimensions are compactified by
a magnetic flux. We systematically construct exact cosmological solutions using
the fact that the system is equivalently described by (6+n)-dimensional pure
Einstein-Maxwell theory via dimensional reduction. In particular, we find a
power-law inflationary solution for a general dilatonic coupling. When the
dilatonic coupling is given by that of Nishino-Sezgin chiral supergravity, this
reduces to the known solution which is not inflating. The power-law solution is
shown to be the late-time attractor. We also investigate cosmological tensor
perturbations in this model using the (6+n)-dimensional description. We obtain
the separable equation of motion and find that there always exist a zero mode,
while tachyonic modes are absent in the spectrum. The mass spectrum of
Kaluza-Klein modes is obtained numerically.Comment: 12 pages, 2 figures; v2: references added; v3: version published in
JCA
The Primordial Perturbation Spectrum from Various Expanding and Contracting Phases
In this paper, focusing on the case of single scalar field, we discuss
various expanding and contracting phases generating primordial perturbations,
and study the relation between the primordial perturbation spectrum from these
phases and the parameter w of state equation in details. Furthermore, we offer
an interesting classification for the primordial perturbation spectrum from
various phases, which may have important implications for building an early
universe scenario embedded in possible high energy theories.Comment: 5 pages, 3 eps figure
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