An Environmental Variation of Constants

Models of modified gravity, whereby local tests of gravity are evaded thanks to a screening mechanism of the chameleon or Damour-Polyakov types, lead to a spatial variation of the particle masses and the fine structure constant. This is triggered by the environmental dependence of the value of the scalar field whose presence modifies gravity. In dense media, the field settles at a density dependent value while in sparse environments it takes the background cosmological value. We estimate that the maximal deviation of constants from their present values is constrained by local tests of gravity, and must be less than $10^{-6}$.Comment: 14 pages, 7 figures, published versio

Screening fifth forces in k-essence and DBI models

New fifth forces have not yet been detected in the laboratory or in the solar system, hence it is typically difficult to introduce new light scalar fields that would mediate such forces. In recent years it has been shown that a number of non-linear scalar field theories allow for a dynamical mechanism, such as the Vainshtein and chameleon ones, that suppresses the strength of the scalar fifth force in experimental environments. This is known as screening, however it is unclear how common screening is within non-linear scalar field theories. k-essence models are commonly studied examples of non-linear models, with DBI as the best motivated example, and so we ask whether these non-linearities are able to screen a scalar fifth force. We find that a Vainshtein-like screening mechanism exists for such models although with limited applicability. For instance, we cannot find a screening mechanism for DBI models. On the other hand, we construct a large class of k-essence models which lead to the acceleration of the Universe in the recent past for which the fifth force mediated by the scalar can be screened.Comment: 26 page

The effective field theory of K-mouflage

We describe K-mouflage models of modified gravity using the effective field theory of dark energy. We show how the Lagrangian density $K$ defining the K-mouflage models appears in the effective field theory framework, at both the exact fully nonlinear level and at the quadratic order of the effective action. We find that K-mouflage scenarios only generate the operator $(\delta g^{00}_{(u)})^n$ at each order $n$. We also reverse engineer K-mouflage models by reconstructing the whole effective field theory, and the full cosmological behaviour, from two functions of the Jordan-frame scale factor in a tomographic manner. This parameterisation is directly related to the implementation of the K-mouflage screening mechanism: screening occurs when $K'$ is large in a dense environment such as the deep matter and radiation eras. In this way, K-mouflage can be easily implemented as a calculable subclass of models described by the effective field theory of dark energy which could be probed by future surveys.Comment: 36 pages, 8 figure

Gauge/Cosmology Brane-to-Brane Duality

We introduce a duality relation between two distinct branes, a cosmological brane with macroscopic matter and a holographic brane with microscopic gauge fields. Using brane-world cosmology with a single brane in a 5-dimensional AdS5 background, we find an explicit time-dependent holographic correspondence between the bulk metric surrounding the cosmological brane and the N=4 gauge field theory living on the boundary of the Z2-symmetric mirror bulk, identified with the holographic brane. We then relate the cosmic acceleration on the cosmological brane to the conformal anomaly of the gauge theory on the holographic brane. This leads to a dual microscopic interpretation of the number of e-foldings of the cosmological eras on the cosmological brane.Comment: 21 pages, 1 figur

Chameleon Fragmentation

A scalar field dark energy candidate could couple to ordinary matter and photons, enabling its detection in laboratory experiments. Here we study the quantum properties of the chameleon field, one such dark energy candidate, in an "afterglow" experiment designed to produce, trap, and detect chameleon particles. In particular, we investigate the possible fragmentation of a beam of chameleon particles into multiple particle states due to the highly non-linear interaction terms in the chameleon Lagrangian. Fragmentation could weaken the constraints of an afterglow experiment by reducing the energy of the regenerated photons, but this energy reduction also provides a unique signature which could be detected by a properly-designed experiment. We show that constraints from the CHASE experiment are essentially unaffected by fragmentation for $\phi^4$ and $1/\phi$ potentials, but are weakened for steeper potentials, and we discuss possible future afterglow experiments.Comment: 27 pages, 7 figure

K-mouflage Cosmology: the Background Evolution

We study the cosmology of K-mouflage theories at the background level. We show that the effects of the scalar field are suppressed at high matter density in the early Universe and only play a role in the late time Universe where the deviations of the Hubble rate from its $\Lambda$-CDM counterpart can be of the order five percent for redshifts $1 \lesssim z \lesssim 5$. Similarly, we find that the equation of state can cross the phantom divide in the recent past and even diverge when the effective scalar energy density goes negative and subdominant compared to matter, preserving the positivity of the squared Hubble rate. These features are present in models for which Big Bang Nucleosynthesis is not affected. We analyze the fate of K-mouflage when the nonlinear kinetic terms give rise to ghosts, particle excitations with negative energy. In this case, we find that the K-mouflage theories can only be considered as an effective description of the Universe at low energy below $1$ keV. In the safe ghost-free models, we find that the equation of state always diverges in the past and changes significantly by a few percent since $z\lesssim 1$.Comment: 18 page