Related papers: Spontaneous Lorentz Breaking at High Energies
We consider a class of field theories with a four-vector field $A_{\mu}(x)$ in addition to other fields supplied with a global charge symmetry - theories which have partial gauge symmetry in the sense of only imposing it on those terms in…
Gravitational theories with fixed background fields break local Lorentz and diffeomorphism invariance either explicitly or spontaneously. In the case of explicit breaking it is known that conflicts can arise between the dynamics and…
Effective field theories which describe the coupling between gravity and matter fields have recently been extended to include terms with operators of non-minimal mass dimension. These terms preserve the usual gauge symmetries but may…
Ghost condensation has been recently proposed as a mechanism inducing the spontaneous breaking of Lorentz symmetry. Corrections to the Newton potential generated by a static source have been computed: they yield a limit M < 10 MeV on the…
Motivated by the severity of the bounds on Lorentz violation in the presence of ordinary gravity, we study frameworks in which Lorentz violation does not affect the spacetime geometry. We show that there are at least two inequivalent…
Spontaneous breaking of local Lorentz symmetry occurs when a local vector or tensor field acquires a nonzero vacuum expectation value. The effects of such breaking are examined in the context of gravity theory. These include an associated…
We study a theory where the presence of an extra spin-two field coupled to gravity gives rise to a phase with spontaneously broken Lorentz symmetry. In this phase gravity is massive, and the Weak Equivalence Principle is respected. The…
We review some of the basic features and predictions of a gauge invariant spontaneous Lorentz symmetry breaking model arising from the nonzero vacuum expectation value of the electromagnetic tensor and leading to a nonlinear…
We construct effective field theories in which gravity is modified via spontaneous breaking of local Lorentz invariance. This is a gravitational analogue of the Higgs mechanism. These theories possess additional graviton modes and modified…
It is well known that a theory with explicit Lorentz violation is not invariant under diffeomorphisms. On the other hand, for geometrical theories of gravity, there are alternative transformations, which can be best defined within the…
A relativistic theory for neutrino superluminality is presented (in principle, the same mechanism applies also to other fermions). The theory involves the standard-model particles and one additional heavy sterile neutrino with an…
Effective gravitational field theories with background fields break local Lorentz symmetry and diffeomorphism invariance. Examples include Chern-Simons gravity, massive gravity, and the Standard-Model Extension (SME). The physical…
If textbook Lorentz invariance is actually a property of the equations describing a sector of the excitations of vacuum above some critical distance scale, several sectors of matter with different critical speeds in vacuum can coexist and…
We introduce a new version of non-linear electrodynamics which is produced by a spontaneous symmetry breaking of Lorentz invariance induced by the non-zero expectation value of the electromagnetic field strength. The symmetry breaking…
Gravitational theories with Lorentz violation must account for a number of possible features in order to be consistent theoretically and phenomenologically. A brief summary of these features is given here. They include evasion of a no-go…
Many theories of modified gravity with higher order derivatives are usually ignored because of serious problems that appear due to an additional ghost degree of freedom. Most dangerously, it causes an immediate decay of the vacuum. However,…
We study the effect of spontaneous breaking of Lorentz invariance on black hole thermodynamics. We consider a scenario where Lorentz symmetry breaking manifests itself by the difference of maximal velocities attainable by particles of…
If textbook Lorentz invariance is actually a property of the equations describing a sector of the excitations of vacuum above some critical distance scale, several sectors of matter with different critical speeds in vacuum can coexist and…
We discuss situations under which Lorentz symmetry is violated in effective gravitational field theories that arise in the low-energy limit of strings. In particular, we discuss spontaneous violation of the symmetry by the ground state of…
We reconsider the possibility of violating the generalized second law of thermodynamics in theories with spontaneous Lorentz violation. It has been proposed that this may be accomplished in particular with a black hole immersed in a ghost…