Higher derivative scalar-tensor theory from the spatially covariant gravity: a linear algebraic analysis

DOI10.1088/1475-7516/2020/11/004zbMATH Open1486.83122arXiv2006.15633OpenAlexW3095870518MaRDI QIDQ5035266FDOQ5035266

Authors: Xian Gao 

Publication date: 21 February 2022

Published in: Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics (Search for Journal in Brave)

Abstract: We investigate the ghostfree scalar-tensor theory with a timelike scalar field, with derivatives of the scalar field up to the third order and with the Riemann tensor up to the quadratic order. We build two types of linear spaces. One is the set of linearly independent generally covariant scalar-tensor monomials, the other is the set of linearly independent spatially covariant gravity monomials. We argue that these two types of linear space are isomorphic to each other in the sense of gauge fixing/recovering procedures. We then identify the subspaces in the spatially covariant gravity, which are spanned by linearly independent monomials built of the extrinsic and intrinsic curvature, the lapse function as well as their spatial derivatives, up to the fourth order in the total number of derivatives. The vectors in these subspaces, i.e., spatially covariant polynomials, automatically propagate at most three degrees of freedom. As a result, their images under the gauge recovering mappings are automatically the subspaces of scalar-tensor theory that propagate up to three degrees of freedom as long as the scalar field is timelike. The mappings from the spaces of spatially covariant gravity to the spaces of scalar-tensor theory are encoded in the projection matrices, of which we also derived the expressions explicitly. Our formalism and results can be useful in deriving the generally covariant higher derivative scalar-tensor theory without ghost(s).

Full work available at URL: https://arxiv.org/abs/2006.15633

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zbMATH Keywords

gravitymodified gravity

Mathematics Subject Classification ID

Analysis of variance and covariance (ANOVA) (62J10) Perturbations in context of PDEs (35B20) Methods of global Riemannian geometry, including PDE methods; curvature restrictions (53C21) Yang-Mills and other gauge theories in mechanics of particles and systems (70S15) Relativistic gravitational theories other than Einstein's, including asymmetric field theories (83D05) Matrix models and tensor models for quantum field theory (81T32)

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Cited In (6)

• Higher derivative scalar tensor theory in unitary gauge
• Gravitational scalar-tensor theory
• Spatially covariant gravity with velocity of the lapse function: the Hamiltonian analysis
• Spontaneous Lorentz symmetry breaking and one-loop effective action in the metric-affine bumblebee gravity
• Power spectra and circular polarization of primordial gravitational waves with parity and Lorentz violations
• Ghost free theory in unitary gauge: a new candidate

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