The warping of extra spaces accelerates the expansion of the universe

Abstract

Generic cosmological models derived from higher dimensional theories with warped extra dimensions have a nonzero cosmological constant-like term induced on the 3+1 space-time, or a physical 3-brane. In the scenario where this 3+1 space-time is an inflating de Sitter "brane" embedded in a higher-dimensional space-time, described by warped geometry, the 4D cosmological term is determined in terms of two length scales: one is a scale associated with the size of extra dimension(s) and the other is a scale associated with the warping of extra space(s). The existence of this term in four dimensions provides a tantalizing possibility of explaining the observed accelerating expansion of the universe from fundamental theories of gravity, e.g. string theory.Comment: 7 pages, no figure; Selected for an "Honorable Mention" (15 May 2010) in the Gravity Research Foundation 2010 Awards for Essays on Gravitatio