Related papers: Weinberg's theorem, phantom crossing and screening
We describe the late-time acceleration of the Universe within the paradigm of the brane-world scenario. More precisely, we show how a phantom-like behaviour or a crossing of the cosmological constant line can be achieved safely in a…
Current cosmological data seem to show that dark energy is evolving in time and that it possibly crossed the phantom divide in the past. So far the only theories that lead to such a behavior involve a non-trivial coupling between dark…
A common belief is that further quantum corrections near the singularity of a large black hole should not substantially modify the semiclassical picture of black hole evaporation; in particular, the outgoing spectrum of radiation should be…
If the dark energy equation of state parameter w(z) crosses the phantom divide line w=-1 (or equivalently if the expression d(H^2(z))/dz - 3\Omega_m H_0^2 (1+z)^2 changes sign) at recent redshifts, then there are two possible cosmological…
To ask a question about a black hole in quantum gravity, one must restrict initial or boundary data to ensure that a black hole is actually present. For two-dimensional dilaton gravity, and probably a much wider class of theories, I show…
We compute the graviton one loop contribution to a classical energy in a \textit{traversable} wormhole background. The form of the shape function considered is obtained by the equation of state $p=\omega\rho$. We investigate the size of the…
Recently a lot of attention has been given to building dark energy models in which the equation-of-state parameter $w$ can cross the phantom divide $w=-1$. However, to our knowledge, these models with crossing the phantom divide only…
We employ the recently proposed formalism of the "horizon wave-function" to investigate the emergence of a horizon in models of black holes as Bose-Einstein condensates of gravitons. We start from the Klein-Gordon equation for a massless…
Many theories of modified gravity, including the well studied Horndeski models, are characterized by a screening mechanism that ensures that standard gravity is recovered near astrophysical bodies. In a recently introduced class of…
f(R) gravity is one of the simplest generalizations of general relativity, which may explain the accelerated cosmic expansion without introducing a cosmological constant. Transformed into the Einstein frame, a new scalar degree of freedom…
The cosmic acceleration is one of the most significant cosmological discoveries over the last century. Following the more accurate data a more dramatic result appears: the recent analysis of the observation data (especially from SNe Ia)…
Goldstone's theorem does not apply straightforwardly to the case of spontaneously broken scale invariance. We elucidate under what conditions a light scalar degree of freedom, identifiable with the dilaton, can naturally arise. Our…
We identify the class of f(R) dark energy models which have a viable cosmology, i.e. a matter dominated epoch followed by a late-time acceleration. The deviation from a LambdaCDM model (f=R-Lambda) is quantified by the function…
According to the correspondence principle of Horowitz and Polchinski, many black holes in string theory are continuously deformed to usual quantum systems involving D-branes and fundamental strings when the string coupling becomes…
A vacuum instability due to a massless ghost in a hidden sector can lead to an effective equation of state for dark energy that changes smoothly from $w=-3/2$ at large redshifts, to $w\approx-1.2$ today, to $w=-1$ in the future. We discuss…
The recent observations of the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument (DESI) indicated the possibility that the dark energy equation of state parameter $w$ might change from $w<-1$ to $w>-1$ when the redshift $z\sim 0.5$, which is called the…
Recent astrophysical observations indicate that the proton-electron mass ratio and the fine structure constant have gone through nontrivial time evolution. We discuss their time variation in the context of a dilaton runaway scenario with…
Viable modifications of gravity that may produce cosmic acceleration need to be screened in high-density regions such as the Solar System, where general relativity is well tested. Screening mechanisms also prevent strong anomalies in the…
One of the few firm predictions of string theory is the existence of a massless scalar field coupled to gravity, the dilaton. In its presence, the value of the fundamental constants of the universe, such as the fine-structure constant, will…
A megascopic revalidation is offered providing responses and resolutions of current inconsistencies and existing contradictions in present-day quantum theory. As the core of this study we present an independent proof of the Goldstone…