Related papers: Removing Ostrogradski ghost from degenerate gravit…
We show that starting from initial conditions with stable perturbations, evolution of a galileon scalar field results in the appearance of a ghost later on. To demonstrate this, we consider a theory with k-essence and cubic galileon…
This chapter of the Handbook of Quantum Gravity aims to illustrate how nonlocality can be implemented in field theories, as well as the manner it solves fundamental difficulties of gravitational theories. We review Stelle's quadratic…
The degree of freedom of the scalar field in scalar-tensor gravity is employed as "time" to deparametrize the Hamiltonian constraint of the theory. The deparametrized system is then nonperturbatively quantized by the approach of loop…
The inclusion of higher derivatives is a necessary condition for a renormalizable or superrenormalizable local theory of quantum gravity. On the other hand, higher derivatives lead to classical instabilities and a loss of unitarity at the…
We present an alternative geometric inspired derivation of the quantum cosmology arising from a brane universe in the context of {\it geodetic gravity}. We set up the Regge-Teitelboim model to describe our universe, and we recover its…
We derive the scalar-tensor Hamiltonian constraint to all orders of momenta when the canonical constraint algebra is deformed by a phase space function as predicted by some studies into loop quantum cosmology. We find that the momenta and…
Exotic General Massive Gravity is the next-to-simplest gravitational theory fulfilling the so-called third-way consistency, the simplest being Minimal Massive Gravity. We investigate the canonical structure of the first-order formulation of…
We show that general infrared modifications of the Einstein-Hilbert action obtained by addition of curvature invariants are not viable. These modifications contain either ghosts or light gravity scalars. A very specific fine-tuning might…
The Hamiltonian analysis for the linearized $\lambda R$ gravity plus a Chern-Simons term is performed. The first-class and second-class constraints for arbitrary values of $\lambda$ are presented, and one physical degree of freedom is…
Negative kinetic energies correspond to ghost degrees of freedom, which are potentially of relevance for cosmology, quantum gravity, and high energy physics. We present a novel wide class of stable mechanical systems where a positive energy…
Reducible gauge theories with constraints linear in the momenta are quantized. The equivalence of the reduced phase space quantization, Dirac quantization and BRST quantization is established. The ghosts of ghosts are found to play a…
Using the Dirac constraint method we show that the pure fourth-order Pais-Uhlenbeck oscillator model is free of observable negative norm states. Even though such ghosts do appear when the fourth order theory is coupled to a second order…
We study cosmological perturbations in mimetic matter scenario with a general higher derivative function. We calculate the quadratic action and show that both the kinetic term and the gradient term have the wrong sings. We perform the…
We present a novel way to constrain the ghost field with respect to other physical fields present in a given theory such that the theory becomes quantizable. This is achieved by imposing positivity of the total kinetic energy of the system…
In massive gravity and in bimetric theories of gravity, two constraints are needed to eliminate the two phase-space degrees of freedom of the Boulware-Deser ghost. For recently proposed non-linear theories, a Hamiltonian constraint has been…
We systematically construct ghost-free scalar-tensor theories whose Lagrangian includes up to third-order derivatives of the scalar field. Using a spatially covariant action written in terms of the ADM variables, we impose degeneracy and…
We propose and study a new first order version of the ghost-free massive gravity. Instead of metrics or tetrads, it uses a connection together with Plebanski's chiral 2-forms as fundamental variables, rendering the phase space structure…
Degenerate Higher Order Scalar Tensor (DHOST) theories are the most general scalar-tensor theories whose Lagrangian depends on the metric tensor and a single scalar field and its derivatives up to second order. They propagate only one…
This is a brief review of modified gravity cosmologies. Generically extensions of gravity action involve higher derivative terms, which can result in ghosts and instabilities. There are three ways to circumvent this: Chern-Simons terms,…
The problems that are connected with Lagrangians which depend on higher order derivatives (namely additional degrees of freedom, unbound energy from below, etc.) are absent if effective Lagrangians are considered because the equations of…