English

Relativistic Quantum Gravity at a Lifshitz Point

High Energy Physics - Theory 2015-05-13 v4 Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology High Energy Physics - Phenomenology

Abstract

We show that the Horava theory for the completion of General Relativity at UV scales can be interpreted as a gauge fixed theory, and it can be extended to an invariant theory under the full group of four-dimensional diffeomorphisms. In this respect, although being fully relativistic, it results to be locally anisotropic in the time-like and space-like directions defined by a family of irrotational observers. We show that this theory propagates generically three degrees of freedom: two of them are related to the four-dimensional diffeomorphism invariant graviton (the metric) and one is related to a propagating scalar mode. Finally, we note that in the present formulation, matter can be consistently coupled to gravity.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.0906.1201,
  title  = {Relativistic Quantum Gravity at a Lifshitz Point},
  author = {Cristiano Germani and Alex Kehagias and Konstadinos Sfetsos},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:0906.1201},
  year   = {2015}
}

Comments

v4: Erratum added: explanation on the true dynamical fields of the relativistic theory added. The theory is interpreted as a Tensor-Scalar relativistic theory. Reference added. Version accepted in JHEP

R2 v1 2026-06-21T13:10:14.471Z