English

Dynamical 4-D Gauss-Bonnet action from matter-graviton interactions in a curved background

High Energy Physics - Theory 2026-02-26 v1 General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology

Abstract

The Glavan-Lin proposal for 4D Einstein-Gauss-Bonnet (EGB) gravity introduces a singular dimensional scaling to bypass Lovelock's theorem, though its fundamental origin remains debated. In this work, we demonstrate that this specific dimension-dependent scaling naturally emerges from the one-loop self-energy corrections of gravitons. By employing real-space techniques to evaluate graviton interactions with minimally coupled scalar and electromagnetic fields in a de Sitter background, we show that the 1/(D4)1/(D-4) pole universally generates a dynamical Gauss-Bonnet term. This confirms that the scaling is not an ad-hoc classical limit but a necessary consequence of quantum field-theoretic renormalization. Furthermore, canceling the remaining divergences strictly requires the inclusion of quadratic curvature counterterms, specifically Weyl-squared and R2R^2 invariants. We discuss the implications of this in the early-Universe and consequences in strong gravity regime.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2602.21822,
  title  = {Dynamical 4-D Gauss-Bonnet action from matter-graviton interactions in a curved background},
  author = {Apurv Keer and S. Shankaranarayanan},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2602.21822},
  year   = {2026}
}

Comments

21 pages, 2 figures, comments welcome