Related papers: Higuchi Ghosts and Gradient Instabilities in Bimet…
Perturbation theory for gravity in dimensions greater than two requires higher derivatives in the free action. Higher derivatives seem to lead to ghosts, states with negative norm. We consider a fourth order scalar field theory and show…
We disprove the widespread belief that higher order curvature theories of gravity in the metric-affine formalism are generally ghost-free. This is clarified by considering a sub-class of theories constructed only with the Ricci tensor and…
In the simplest Higgs phase of gravity called ghost condensation, an accelerating universe with a phantom era (w<-1) can be realized without ghost or any other instabilities. In this paper we show how to reconstruct the potential in the…
We consider a scalar field with a negative kinetic term minimally coupled to gravity. We obtain an exact non-static spherically symmetric solution which describes a wormhole in cosmological setting. The wormhole is shown to connect two…
Bimetric gravity can reproduce the accelerated expansion of the Universe, without a cosmological constant. However, the stability of these solutions to linear perturbations has been questioned, suggesting exponential growth of structure in…
We construct an asymmetric bouncing scenario within the VCDM model - also known as type-II minimally modified gravity -, a modified gravity theory with two local physical degrees of freedom. The scenario is exempt of any ghost or gradient…
Bouncing solutions are obtained from a generally covariant action characterized by a potential which is a nonlocal functional of the dilaton field at two separated space-time points. Gradient instabilities are shown to arise in this context…
We consider generic derivative corrections to the Einstein gravity and find new classes of theories without ghost around the Minkowski background by means of an extension of the spacetime geometry. We assume the Riemann-Cartan geometry,…
We study quantum modifications to cosmology in a Friedmann-Robertson-Walker universe with and without scalar fields by taking the renormalisation group running of gravitational and matter couplings into account. We exploit the Bianchi…
An extension of the bimetric theory of gravity is considered that includes quadratic Ricci curvature terms associated with each metric. The issue of the Boulware-Deser ghost is analyzed. The Hamiltonian constraint is derived and the…
We study cosmological implications of bigravity and massive gravity solutions with non-simultaneously diagonal metrics by considering the generalized Gordon and Kerr-Schild ansatzes. The scenario that we obtain is equivalent to that of…
The unphysical spin-2 massive degrees of freedom in higher derivative gravity may be either massive unphysical ghosts or tachyonic ghosts. In the last case there is no Planck-scale threshold protecting vacuum cosmological solutions from…
We consider a model of non-local gravity with a large bare cosmological constant, $\Lambda$, and study its cosmological solutions. The model is characterized by a function $f(\psi)=f_0 e^{\alpha\psi}$ where $\psi=\Box^{-1}R$ and $\alpha$ is…
We derive the full perturbative equations of motion for the most general background solutions in ghost-free bimetric theory in its metric formulation. Clever field redefinitions at the level of fluctuations enable us to circumvent the…
We explore the possibility of realising self-accelerated expansion of the Universe taking into account the vector components of a massive graviton. The effective action in the decoupling limit contains an infinite number of terms, once the…
We look at some dynamic geometries produced by scalar fields with both the "right" and the "wrong" sign of the kinetic energy. We start with anisotropic homogeneous universes with closed, open and flat spatial sections. A non-singular…
The quantum theory of a free particle on a portion of two-dimensional Euclidean space bounded by a circle and subject to non-local boundary conditions gives rise to bulk and surface states. Starting from this well known property, a…
The gauge hierarchy problem could find a solution within the scenario of asymptotic safety for quantum gravity. We discuss a "resurgence mechanism" where the running dimensionless coupling responsible for the Higgs scalar mass first…
In this work we shall study ghost-free non-local $F(R)$ gravity models. Firstly we shall demonstrate how the ghost degrees of freedom may occur in the non-local $F(R)$ gravity models, and accordingly we shall modify appropriately the…
We study the static cosmological solutions and their stability at background level in the framework of massive bigravity theory with Friedmann-Robertson-Walker (FRW) metrics. By the modification proposed in the cosmological equations…