Related papers: A comment on the matter-graviton coupling
General Relativity is usually formulated as a theory with gauge invariance under the diffeomorphism group, but there is a 'dilaton' formulation where it is in addition invariant under Weyl transformations, and a 'unimodular' formulation…
We consider some flat space theories for spin 2 gravitons, with less invariance than full diffeomorphisms. For the massless case, classical stability and absence of ghosts require invariance under transverse diffeomorphisms (TDiff). Generic…
New features of the generalized symmetries of generic two-dimensional dilaton models of gravity are presented and invariant gravity-matter couplings are introduced. We show that there is a continuum set of Noether symmetries, which contains…
We present an overview on relational observables in gravity mainly from a loop quantum gravity perspective. The gauge group of general relativity is the diffeomorphism group of the underlying manifold. Consequently, general relativity is a…
Transverse Diffeomorphism (TDiff) theories are well-motivated theories of gravity from the quantum perspective, which are based upon a gauge symmetry principle. The main contribution of this work is to firmly establish a correspondence…
We explore the hypothesis that the set of symmetries enjoyed by the theory that describes gravity is not the full group of diffeomorphisms Diff(M), as in General Relativity, but a maximal subgroup of it, TransverseDiff(M), with its elements…
We construct the most general effective Lagrangian coupling gravity and electromagnetism up to mass dimension 6 by enumerating all possible non-minimal coupling terms respecting both diffeomorphism and gauge invariance. In all, there are…
We revisit the problem of constraining the weak field limit of the gravitational lagrangian from S-matrix properties. From unitarity and Lorentz invariance of the S-matrix of massless gravitons, we derive on-shell gauge invariance to…
We formally prove the existence of a quantization procedure that makes the path integral of a general diffeomorphism-invariant theory of gravity, with fixed total spacetime volume, equivalent to that of its unimodular version. This is…
The traditional presentation of Unimodular Gravity (UG) consists on indicating that it is an alternative theory of gravity that restricts the generic diffeomorphism invariance of General Relativity. In particular, as often encountered in…
We generalize and unify the $f(R,T)$ and $f(R,L_m)$ type gravity models by assuming that the gravitational Lagrangian is given by an arbitrary function of the Ricci scalar $R$, of the trace of the energy-momentum tensor $T$, and of the…
This paper discusses the implementation of diffeomorphism invariance in purely Hamiltonian formulations of General Relativity. We observe that, if a constrained Hamiltonian formulation derives from a manifestly covariant Lagrangian, the…
Starting from a knowledge of certain identities in the Lagrangian description, the diffeomorphism transformations of metric and connection are obtained for both the second order (metric) and the first order (Palatini) formulations of…
Unimodular Gravity is normally assumed to be equivalent to General Relativity for all matters but the character of the Cosmological Constant. Here we discuss this equivalence in the presence of a non-minimally coupled scalar field. We show…
Massive gravity theory introduced by de Rham, Gabadadze, Tolley (dRGT) is restricted by several uniqueness theorems that protect the form of the potential and kinetic terms, as well as the matter coupling. These restrictions arise from the…
A gauge and diffeomorphism invariant theory in (2+1)-dimensions is presented in both first and second order Lagrangian form as well as in a Hamiltonian form. For gauge group $SO(1,2)$, the theory is shown to describe ordinary Einstein…
We continue our investigation of massive gravity in the massless limit of vanishing graviton mass. From gauge invariance we derive the most general coupling between scalar matter and gravity. We get further couplings beside the standard…
In the present paper, we revisit gravitational theories which are invariant under TDiffs -- transverse (volume preserving) diffeomorphisms and global scale transformations. It is known that these theories can be rewritten in an equivalent…
It is well known that general relativity (GR) does not possess any non-trivial local (in a precise standard sense) and diffeomorphism invariant observables. We propose a generalized notion of local observables, which retain the most…
A general diffeomorphism invariant SU(2) gauge theory is a gravity theory with two propagating polarizations of the graviton. We develop this description of gravity, in particular for future applications to the perturbative quantization.…