English

Detecting Vanishing Dimensions Via Primordial Gravitational Wave Astronomy

General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology 2011-03-23 v2 Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics High Energy Physics - Theory

Abstract

Lower-dimensionality at higher energies has manifold theoretical advantages as recently pointed out. Moreover, it appears that experimental evidence may already exists for it - a statistically significant planar alignment of events with energies higher than TeV has been observed in some earlier cosmic ray experiments. We propose a robust and independent test for this new paradigm. Since (2+1)-dimensional spacetimes have no gravitational degrees of freedom, gravity waves cannot be produced in that epoch. This places a universal maximum frequency at which primordial waves can propagate, marked by the transition between dimensions. We show that this cut-off frequency may be accessible to future gravitational wave detectors such as LISA.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1102.3434,
  title  = {Detecting Vanishing Dimensions Via Primordial Gravitational Wave Astronomy},
  author = {Jonas R. Mureika and Dejan Stojkovic},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1102.3434},
  year   = {2011}
}

Comments

Somewhat expanded version with discussions that could not fit into the PRL version; references added