Related papers: Generalising the matter coupling in massive gravit…
In models of modified gravity, extra degrees of freedom usually appear. They must be removed from the spectrum because they may indicate the presence of instabilities and because otherwise the model might not agree with observation. In the…
We consider higher derivative corrections to the graviton three-point coupling within a weakly coupled theory of gravity. Lorentz invariance allows further structures beyond the one present in the Einstein theory. We argue that these are…
We derive constraints on the four dimensional energy-momentum tensor from gravitational and gauge anomalies. Our work can be considered an extension of Duff's analysis [1] to include parity-odd terms and explicit symmetry breaking. The…
General Relativity is expected to break down in the high-curvature regime. Beyond an effective field theory treatment with higher-order operators, it is important to identify consistent theories with higher-curvature terms at the…
Some years ago, it was shown how fermion self-interacting terms of the Thirring-type impact the usual structure of massless two-dimensional gauge theories [1]. In that work only the cases of pure vector and pure chiral gauge couplings have…
Since the main open problem of contemporary physics is to find a unified description of the four interactions, we present a possible scenario which, till now only at the classical level, is able to englobe experiments ranging from…
In our companion papers, we managed to derive a connection formulation of Lorentzian General Relativity in D+1 dimensions with compact gauge group SO(D+1) such that the connection is Poisson commuting, which implies that Loop Quantum…
The geometrical formulation of gravity is not unique and can be set up in a variety of spacetimes. Even though the gravitational sector enjoys this freedom of different geometrical interpretations, consistent matter couplings have to be…
Loop quantum gravity envisions a small scale structure of spacetime that is markedly different from that of the classical spacetime continuum. This has ramifications for the excitation of matter fields and for their coupling to gravity.…
We investigate the late-time cosmological behaviour of scalar-tensor theories with a universal multiplicative coupling between the scalar field and the matter Lagrangian in the matter era. This class of theory encompasses the case of the…
Einstein's equations in a tetrad formulation are derived from a linear theory in flat spacetime with an asymmetric potential using free field gauge invariance, local Lorentz invariance and universal coupling. The gravitational potential can…
We re-examine the problem of strong coupling in a regularized version of DGP (or ``brane-induced'') gravity. We find that the regularization of ref. hep-th/0304148 differs from DGP in that it does not exhibit strong coupling or ghosts up to…
In this thesis, we focus on higher-curvature extensions of Einstein gravity as toy models to probe universal properties of conformal field theory (CFT) using the gauge/gravity duality. In this context, we are particularly interested in…
We argue that Hartle-Hawking states in the Regge quantum gravity model generically contain non-trivial entanglement between gravity and matter fields. Generic impossibility to talk about "matter in a point of space" is in line with the idea…
Starting from the original Einstein action, sometimes called the Gamma squared action, we propose a new setup to formulate modified theories of gravity. This can yield a theory with second order field equations similar to those found in…
The most general theory of gravity in d-dimensions which leads to second order field equations for the metric has [(d-1)/2] free parameters. It is shown that requiring the theory to have the maximum possible number of degrees of freedom,…
We investigate generally covariant theories which admit a Fierz-Pauli mass term for metric perturbations around an arbitrary curved background. For this we restore the general covariance of the Fierz-Pauli mass term by introducing four…
Quantum gravity is investigated in the limit of a large number of space-time dimensions, using as an ultraviolet regularization the simplicial lattice path integral formulation. In the weak field limit the appropriate expansion parameter is…
Effective field theories describing gravity coupled to matter are investigated, allowing for operators of arbitrary mass dimension. Terms violating local Lorentz and diffeomorphism invariance while preserving internal gauge symmetries are…
In this article we consider the problem to what extent the motion of gauge-charged matter that generates the gravitational field can be arbitrary, as well as what equations are superimposed on the gauge field due to conditions of…