Related papers: Puzzles of Large Scale Structure and Gravitation
Motivated mainly by the fact that no charged elementary particles having zero mass have been observed up to now, we investigate the question whether the mass of the elementary particles is connected with their electric charge and whether…
The large-scale structure of the Universe is well approximated by the Friedmann equations, parametrized by several energy densities which can be observationally inferred. A natural question to ask is: How different would the Universe be if…
The cosmological constant presents one of the most fascinating and confounding problems in physics. A straightforward, seemingly robust prediction of quantum mechanics and general relativity is that the vacuum energy gravitates. Therefore,…
The origin of cosmic structure is widely regarded as quantum, yet the Universe today appears classical. Standard lore attributes this to a "quantum-to-classical" transition on super-horizon scales during inflation. Gravity plays a central…
Why are the cosmological constant, electroweak and Planck scales so different? This ``double hierarchy" problem, where $\Lambda \ll M^2_{EW} \ll M^2_p$, is one of the most pressing in fundamental physics. We show that in a theory of $N$…
The physical property of mass has two distinct aspects, gravitational mass and inertial mass. The weight of a particle depends on its gravitational mass. According to the weak form of the equivalence principle, the gravitational and…
We propose an additional term in the classical gravitational force law, which is repelling in nature, and which may solve the dark matter problem. As an inverse cube field interaction, it operates over 4 real spatial dimensions and its…
The linear cosmological perturbation theory of an almost homogeneous and isotropic perfect fluid universe is reconsidered and formally simplified by introducing new covariant and gauge-invariant variables with physical interpretations on…
Following a conjecture of Feynman, we explore the possibility that only those energy forms that are associated with (massive or massless) particles couple to the gravitational field, but not others. We propose an experiment to deflect…
The visible Universe is largely characterised by a single mass-scale; namely, the proton mass, $m_p$. Contemporary theory suggests that $m_p$ emerges as a consequence of gluon self-interactions, which are a defining characteristic of…
We study the behavior of a general gravitational action, including quadratic terms in the curvature, supplemented by a compact scalar field in 4+1 dimensions. The generalized Einstein equation for this system admits solutions which are…
We consider two problems that have vexed physicists for several decades -- dark matter and the cosmological constant. The problem has been that the former has not been detected while the latter gives a far higher value than detected by…
Rich clusters of galaxies, the largest virialized systems known, provide a powerful tool for the study of cosmology. Some of the fundamental questions that can be addressed with clusters of galaxies include: how did galaxies and large-scale…
We propose ten puzzles in particle theory: quark, asymmetries of quantum numbers in the Standard Model, point particle and interaction-distance, mystic Higgs mechanism, possible violation of the Pauli Exclusion Principle and some basic…
Charged, rotating black hole solutions of Einstein's gravitational equations are investigated in the presence of a cosmological constant. A pair of wave equations governing the electromagnetic and gravitational perturbations are derived.
After a short history of the $\Lambda$-term it is explained why the (effective) cosmological constant is expected to obtain contributions from short-distance physics, corresponding to an energy at least as large as the Fermi scale. The…
After a short history of the $\Lambda$-term it is explained why the (effective) cosmological constant is expected to obtain contributions from short-distance-physics, corresponding to an energy scale of at least 100 GeV. The actual tiny…
We discuss the Higgs mass and cosmological constant in the context of an emergent Standard Model, where the gauge symmetries "dissolve" in the extreme ultraviolet. In this scenario the cosmological constant scale is suppressed by power of…
We extend the formalism of Hamiltonian string bit models of quantum gravity type in two spacetime dimensions to include couplings to particles. We find that the single-particle closed and open universe models respectively behave like empty…
The simple examples of spontaneous breaking of various symmetries for the scalar theory with fundamental mass have been considered (this research was supported by the Belgian National Fund for Scientific Research). Higgs' generalizations on…