Related papers: Does cosmological expansion affect local physics?
The physical basis of the standard theory of general relativity is examined and a nonlocal theory of accelerated observers is described that involves a natural generalization of the hypothesis of locality. The nonlocal theory is confronted…
We study the one-loop effective action for gravity in a cosmological setup to determine possible cosmological effects of quantum corrections to Einstein theory. By considering the effect of the universal non-local terms in a toy model, we…
We explore some of the cosmological implications of the recent classical nonlocal generalization of Einstein's theory of gravitation in which nonlocality is due to the gravitational memory of past events. In the Newtonian regime of this…
Our long experience with Newtonian potentials has inured us to the view that gravity only produces local effects. In this paper we challenge this quite deeply ingrained notion and explicitly identify some intrinsically global gravitational…
The geometric foundations of General Relativity are revisited, with particular attention to its gauge invariance, as a key to understanding the true nature of spacetime. Beyond the common image of spacetime as a deformable 'fabric' filling…
The cosmic expansion history tests the dynamics of the global evolution of the universe and its energy density contents, while the cosmic growth history tests the evolution of the inhomogeneous part of the energy density. Precision…
We overview our recent studies of cosmological models with expansion and global rotation. Problems of the early rotating models are discussed, and the class of new viable cosmologies is described in detail. Particular attention is paid to…
The principles of General Relativity allow for a non-vanishing cosmological constant, which can possibly be interpreted at least partially in terms of quantum-fluctuations of matter fields. Depending on sign and magnitude it can cause…
Cosmology contributes a good deal to the investigation of variation of fundamental physical constants. High resolution data is available and allows for detailed analysis over cosmological distances and a multitude of methods were developed.…
An attempt is made here to extend to the microscopic domain the scale invariant character of gravitation - which amounts to consider expansion as applying to any physical scale. Surprisingly, this hypothesis does not prevent the redshift…
As evidenced by a great number of works, it is common practice to assume that the Universe is flat. However, the majority of studies which make use of observational data to constrain the curvature density parameter are premised on the…
We investigate the conditions under which cosmological variations in physical `constants' and scalar fields are detectable on the surface of local gravitationally-bound systems, such as planets, in non-spherically symmetric background…
We study the dynamics of extended test bodies in flat Friedmann-Robertson-Walker spacetimes. It is shown that such objects can usually alter their inertial mass, spin, and center-of-mass trajectory purely through the use of internal…
Although cosmic expansion at very small distances is usually dismissed as entirely inconsequential, these extraordinarily small effects may in fact have a real and significant influence on our world. A calculation suggests that the minute…
When taking the real, inhomogeneous and anisotropic matter distribution in the semi-local universe into account, there may be no need to postulate an accelerating expansion of the universe despite recent type Ia supernova data. Local…
In general-relativistic cosmological models, the expansion history, matter content, and geometry are closely intertwined. In this brief paper, we clarify the distinction between the effects of geometry and expansion history on the…
We show by using the method of matched asymptotic expansions that a sufficient condition can be derived which determines when a local experiment will detect the cosmological variation of a scalar field which is driving the spacetime…
Numerical N-body simulations of large scale structure formation in the universe are based on Newtonian gravity. However, according to our current understanding, the most correct theory of gravity is general relativity. It is therefore…
Possibility of gravitational repulsion in General Relativity is discussed and astronomical data in favor of cosmological acceleration are described. The problem of vacuum energy is emphasized and possible ways of its solution are indicated.…
The observational evidence for the existence of a non-zero cosmological constant is getting stronger. It is therefore timely to address the question of its eventual effect on the dynamics of galaxies, clusters and larger structures in the…