Related papers: Chameleon Dark Energy
Explanations of the late-time cosmic acceleration within the framework of general relativity are plagued by difficulties. General relativistic models are mostly based on a dark energy field with fine-tuned, unnatural properties. There is a…
Cosmic acceleration is widely believed to require either a source of negative pressure (i.e., dark energy), or a modification of gravity, which necessarily implies new degrees of freedom beyond those of Einstein gravity. In this paper we…
We investigate the possibility of replacing the cosmological constant with gradual condensation of a scalar field produced during the decay of a superheavy dark matter. The advantage of this class of models to the ordinary quintessence is…
The so called `cosmic coincidence' problem seems to suggest a coupling between dark energy and dark matter. A possibility could be given by dark matter particles with masses depending exponentially on the scalar field associated to dark…
Recent observations confirm that our universe is flat and consists of a dark energy component $\Omega_{DE}\simeq 0.7$. This dark energy is responsible for the cosmic acceleration as well as determines the feature of future evolution of the…
A huge amount of good quality data converges towards the picture of a spatially flat universe undergoing the today observed phase of accelerated expansion. This new observational trend is commonly addressed as Precision Cosmology. Despite…
Recently it has been proposed that the main contributor to the dark energy of the Universe is a dynamical, slow evolving, spatially inhomogeneous scalar field called quintessence. We investigate the behavior of this scalar field at galactic…
The discovery ten years ago that the expansion of the Universe is accelerating put in place the present cosmological model, in which the Universe is composed of 4% baryons, 20% dark matter, and 76% dark energy. Yet the underlying cause of…
We present the most recent results of both aspects of the GammeV experiment. The first aspect is a search for axion-like particles using a variable baseline, "light-shining-through-a-wall" technique. This search excludes the particle…
The fact that the energy densities of dark energy and matter are similar currently, known as the coincidence problem, is one of the main unsolved problems of cosmology. We present here a model in which a spatial curvature of the universe…
Recent observations provide strong evidence that the universe is accelerating. This confronts theory with a severe challenge. Explanations of the acceleration within the framework of general relativity are plagued by difficulties. General…
Velocity-dependent interactions in a fundamental-string dominated universe lead quite naturally, with reasonable assumptions on initial conditions, to an accelerating expanding universe without assuming the existence of a cosmological…
Dark energy appears to be the dominant component of the physical Universe, yet there is no persuasive theoretical explanation for its existence or magnitude. The acceleration of the Universe is, along with dark matter, the observed…
We propose that dark energy in the form of a scalar field could effectively couple to dark matter inhomogeneities. Through this coupling energy could be transferred to/from the scalar field, which could possibly enter an accelerated regime.…
We consider different methods to probe chameleons with slow neutrons. Chameleon modify the potential of bouncing neutrons over a flat mirror in the terrestrial gravitational field. This induces a shift in the energy levels of the neutrons…
Observations suggest that nearly seventy per cent of the energy density in the universe is unclustered and exerts negative pressure. Theoretical understanding of this component (`dark energy'), which is driving an accelerated expansion of…
In a dense cloud of massive fermions interacting by exchange of a light scalar field, the effective mass of the fermion can become negligibly small. As the cloud expands, the effective mass and the total energy density eventually increase…
While considering the chameleon scalar field model with the spatially flat FLRW background, we investigate the late-time acceleration phase of the universe, wherein we apply the typical potential usually used in this model. Through setting…
Scalar-tensor theories whose phenomenology differs significantly from general relativity on large (e.g. cosmological) scales do not typically pass local experimental tests (e.g. in the solar system) unless they present a suitable "screening…
Recent observations suggest that a large fraction of the energy density of the universe has negative pressure. One explanation is vacuum energy density; another is quintessence in the form of a scalar field slowly evolving down a potential.…