Is Cosmic Parity Violation Responsible for the Anomalies in the WMAP Data?

This research demonstrates that parity violation in general relativity can simultaneously explain the observed loss in power and alignment at a preferred axis ('Axis of Evil')in the low multipole moments of the WMAP data. This observational possibility also provides an experimental window for an inflationary leptogenesis mechanism arising from large-scale parity violation. A velocity dependent potential is induced from gravitational backreaction, which modifies the primordial scalar angular power spectrum of density perturbations in the CMB. This modification suppresses power of odd parity multipoles on large scales which can be associated with the scale of a massive right-handed neutrino.Comment: 5 pages, included new references, expanded on some calculation

Superconducting loop quantum gravity and the cosmological constant

We argue that the cosmological constant is exponentially suppressed in a candidate ground state of loop quantum gravity as a nonperturbative effect of a holographic Fermi-liquid theory living on a two-dimensional spacetime. Ashtekar connection components, corresponding to degenerate gravitational configurations breaking large gauge invariance and CP symmetry, behave as composite fermions that condense as in Bardeen-Cooper-Schrieffer theory of superconductivity. Cooper pairs admit a description as wormholes on a de Sitter boundary.Comment: 10 pages; v2 matches the published versio

Brane Gas Cosmology, M-theory and Little String Theory

We generalize the Brane Gas Cosmological Scenario to M-theory degrees of freedom, namely $M5$ and $M2$ branes. Without brane intersections, the Brandenberger Vafa(BV) arguments applied to M-theory degrees of freedom generically predict a large 6 dimensional spacetime. We show that intersections of $M5$ and $M2$ branes can instead lead to a large 4 dimensional spacetime. One dimensional intersections in 11D is related to (2,0) little strings (LST) on NS5 branes in type IIA. The gas regime of membranes in M-theory corresponds to the thermodynamics of LST obtained from holography. We propose a mechanism whereby LST living on the worldvolume of NS5 (M5)-branes wrapping a five dimensional torus, annihilate most efficiently in 3+1 dimensions leading to a large 3+1 dimensional spacetime. We also show that this picture is consistent with the gas approximation in M-theory.Comment: 8 page