Arxiv gr-qc

Authors: O. B. Zaslavskii

The recently discovered so-called BSW effect consists in the unbound growth of the energy E_{c.m.} in the centre of mass frame of two colliding particles near the black hole horizon. We consider a new type of the corresponding scenario when one of two particles ("critical") remains at rest near the horizon of the charged near-extremal black hole due to balance between the attractive and repulsion forces. The other one hits it with a speed close to that of light. This scenario shows in a most pronounced way the kinematic nature of the BSW effect. In the extremal limit, one would gain formally infinite E_{c.m.} but this does not happen since it would have require the critical massive particle to remain at rest on the null horizon surface that is impossible.

Authors: Karthik Balakrishnan, Ke-Xun Sun, Abdul Alfauwaz, Ahmad Aljadaan, Mohammed Almajeed, Muflih Alrufaydah, Salman Althubiti, Homoud Aljabreen, Sasha Buchman, Robert L Byer, John Conklin, Daniel DeBra, John Hanson, Eric Hultgren, Turki Al Saud, Seiya Shimizu, Michael Soulage, Andreas Zoellner

Precise control over the potential of an electrically isolated proof mass is necessary for the operation of devices such as a Gravitational Reference Sensor (GRS) and satellite missions such as LISA. We show that AlGaN UV LEDs operating at 255 nm are an effective substitute for Mercury vapor lamps used in previous missions because of their ability to withstand space qualification levels of vibration and thermal cycling. After 27 thermal and thermal vacuum cycles and 9 minutes of 14.07 g RMS vibration, there is less than 3% change in current draw, less than 15% change in optical power, and no change in spectral peak or FWHM (full width at half maximum). We also demonstrate UV LED stimulated photoemission from a wide variety of thin film carbide proof mass coating candidates (SiC, Mo2C, TaC, TiC, ZrC) that were applied using electron beam evaporation on an Aluminum 6061-T6 substrate. All tested carbide films have measured quantum efficiencies of 3.8-6.8*10^-7 and reflectivities of 0.11-0.15, which compare favorably with the properties of previously used gold films. We demonstrate the ability to control proof mass potential on an 89 mm diameter spherical proof mass over a 20 mm gap in a GRS-like configuration. Proof mass potential was measured via a non-contact DC probe, which would allow control without introducing dynamic forcing of the spacecraft. Finally we provide a look ahead to an upcoming technology demonstration mission of UV LEDs and future applications toward charge control of electrically isolated proof masses.

Authors: A. Kashlinsky, F. Atrio-Barandela, H. Ebeling

In this review we present a comprehensive discussion of peculiar velocity field measured recently on very large scales with a novel method using X-ray galaxy clusters as tracers. The measurement is based on the kinematic component of the Sunyaev-Zeldovich (KSZ) effect produced by Compton scattering of cosmic microwave background (CMB) photons off the hot intracluster gas, and uses a large catalog of X-ray selected clusters and all-sky CMB maps obtained with the WMAP satellite. The method probes the dipole of the CMB temperature field evaluated at the cluster positions and within the apertures in which the CMB monopole contribution vanishes, thereby isolating the signal remaining from the KSZ effect produced by coherently moving clusters. The detection of a highly significant dipole out to the depth of at least ~ 800 Mpc casts doubt on the notion that gravitational instability from the observed mass distribution is the sole -- or even dominant -- cause of the detected motions. Rather it appears that the flow may extend across the entire observable Universe. Possible implications include the possibility to constrain the primeval preinflationary structure of space-time and its landscape, and/or the need for modifications of presently known physics (e.g. arising from a higher-dimensional structure of gravity). We review these possibilities in light of the measurements described here and specifically discuss the prospects of future measurements and the issues they should resolve. We address the consistency of these large-scale velocity measurements with those obtained on smaller scales by studies using galaxies as tracers, and resolve the discrepancies with two recent claims based on modified CMB analysis schemes.

Authors: Valerio Faraoni, Andres F. Zambrano Moreno, Roshina Nandra

The bizarre behaviour of the apparent (black hole and cosmological) horizons of the McVittie spacetime is discussed using, as an analogy, the Schwarzschild-de Sitter-Kottler spacetime (which is a special case of McVittie anyway). For a dust-dominated "background" universe, a black hole cannot exist at early times because its (apparent) horizon would be larger than the cosmological(apparent) horizon. A phantom-dominated "background" universe causes this situation, and the horizon behaviour, to be time-reversed.

Authors: H. T. Cho, B. L. Hu

We calculate the expectation values of the stress-energy bitensor defined at two different spacetime points $x, x'$ of a massless, minimally coupled scalar field with respect to a quantum state at finite temperature $T$ in a flat $N$-dimensional spacetime by means of the generalized zeta-function method. These correlators, also known as the noise kernels, give the fluctuations of energy and momentum density of a quantum field which are essential for the investigation of the physical effects of negative energy density in certain spacetimes or quantum states. They also act as the sources of the Einstein-Langevin equations in stochastic gravity which one can solve for the dynamics of metric fluctuations as in spacetime foams. In terms of constitutions these correlators are one rung above (in the sense of the correlation -- BBGKY or Schwinger-Dyson -- hierarchies) the mean (vacuum and thermal expectation) values which drive the semiclassical Einstein equation in semiclassical gravity. The low and the high temperature expansions of these correlators are also given here: At low temperatures, the leading order temperature dependence goes like $T^{N}$ while at high temperatures they have a $T^{2}$ dependence with the subleading terms exponentially suppressed by $e^{-T}$. We also discuss the singular behaviors of the correlators in the $x'\rightarrow x$ coincident limit as was done before for massless conformal quantum fields.

Authors: Peter K.F. Kuhfittig

It is shown in this paper that thin-shell wormholes, mathematically constructed by the standard cut-and-paste technique, can, under fairly general conditions, be compatible with quantum field theory.

Authors: Fulvio Melia

Cosmological redshift z grows as the Universe expands and is conventionally viewed as a third form of redshift, beyond the more traditional Doppler and gravitational effects seen in other applications of general relativity. In this paper, we examine the origin of redshift in the Friedmann-Robertson-Walker metrics with constant spacetime curvature, and show that---at least for the static spacetimes---the interpretation of z as due to the "stretching" of space is coordinate dependent. Namely, we prove that redshift may also be calculated solely from the effects of kinematics and gravitational acceleration. This suggests that its dependence on the expansion factor is simply a manifestation of the high degree of symmetry in FRW, and ought not be viewed as evidence in support of the idea that space itself is expanding.

Authors: Andrea Taracchini, Yi Pan, Alessandra Buonanno, Enrico Barausse, Michael Boyle, Tony Chu, Geoffrey Lovelace, Harald P. Pfeiffer, Mark A. Scheel

We first use five non-spinning and two mildly spinning (chi_i \simeq -0.44, +0.44) numerical-relativity waveforms of black-hole binaries and calibrate an effective-one-body (EOB) model for non-precessing spinning binaries, notably its dynamics and the dominant (2,2) gravitational-wave mode. Then, we combine the above results with recent outcomes of small-mass-ratio simulations produced by the Teukolsky equation and build a prototype EOB model for detection purposes, which is capable of generating inspiral-merger-ringdown waveforms for non-precessing spinning black-hole binaries with any mass ratio and individual black-hole spins -1 \leq chi_i \lesssim 0.7. We compare the prototype EOB model to two equal-mass highly spinning numerical-relativity waveforms of black holes with spins chi_i = -0.95, +0.97, which were not available at the time the EOB model was calibrated. In the case of Advanced LIGO we find that the mismatch between prototype-EOB and numerical-relativity waveforms is always smaller than 0.003 for total mass 20-200 M_\odot, the mismatch being computed by maximizing only over the initial phase and time. To successfully generate merger waveforms for individual black-hole spins chi_i \gtrsim 0.7, the prototype-EOB model needs to be improved by (i) better modeling the plunge dynamics and (ii) including higher-order PN spin terms in the gravitational-wave modes and radiation-reaction force.

Authors: Carlo Enrico Petrillo, Alexander Dietz

Recent observational and theoretical work increase the confidence that short-duration gamma-ray bursts are created by the coalescence of compact objects, like neutron stars and/or black holes. From the observation of short-duration gamma-ray bursts with know distances it is possible to infer their rate in the local universe, and draw conclusions for the rate of compact binary coalescences. Although the sample of such events with reliable redshift measurements is very small, we try to model the distribution with a luminosity function and a rate function. The analysis performed with a sample of 15 short gamma-ray bursts yields a range for the merger rate of 75 to 660 Gpc$^{-3}$yr$^{-1}$, with a median rate of 180 Gpc$^{-3}$yr$^{-1}$. This result is in general agreement with similar investigations using gamma-ray burst observations. Furthermore, we estimate the number of coincident observations of gravitational wave signals with short gamma-ray bursts in the advanced detector era. Assuming each short gamma-ray burst is created by a double neutron star merger, the expected rate of coincident observations is 0.1 to 1.1 per year, when assuming each short gamma-ray burst is created by a merger of a neutron star and a black hole, this rate becomes 0.4 to 4.0 per year.

Authors: J. A. Ellis, F. A. Jenet, M. A. McLaughlin

Gravitational Waves (GWs) are tiny ripples in the fabric of space-time predicted by Einstein's General Relativity. Pulsar timing arrays (PTAs) are well poised to detect low frequency ($10^{-9}$ -- $10^{-7}$ Hz) GWs in the near future. There has been a significant amount of research into the detection of a stochastic background of GWs from supermassive black hole binaries (SMBHBs). Recent work has shown that single continuous sources standing out above the background may be detectable by PTAs operating at a sensitivity sufficient to detect the stochastic background. The most likely sources of continuous GWs in the pulsar timing frequency band are extremely massive and/or nearby SMBHBs. In this paper we present detection strategies including various forms of matched filtering and power spectral summing. We determine the efficacy and computational cost of such strategies. It is shown that it is computationally infeasible to use an optimal matched filter including the poorly constrained pulsar distances with a grid based method. We show that an Earth-term-matched filter constructed using only the correlated signal terms is both computationally viable and highly sensitive to GW signals. This technique is only a factor of two less sensitive than the computationally unrealizable optimal matched filter and a factor of two more sensitive than a power spectral summing technique. We further show that a pairwise matched filter, taking the pulsar distances into account is comparable to the optimal matched filter for the single template case and comparable to the Earth-term-matched filter for many search templates. Finally, using simulated data optimal quality, we place a theoretical minimum detectable strain amplitude of $h>2\times 10^{-15}$ from continuous GWs at frequencies on the order $\sim1/T_{\rm obs}$.

Authors: J.-E. Daum, M.Reuter

The renormalization group (RG) properties of quantum gravity are explored, using the vielbein and the spin connection as the fundamental field variables. The scale dependent effective action is required to be invariant both under space time diffeomorphisms and local frame rotations. The nonperturbative RG equation is solved explicitly on the truncated theory space defined by a three parameter family of Holst-type actions which involve a running Immirzi parameter. We find evidence for the existence of an asymptotically safe fundamental theory, probably inequivalent to metric quantum gravity constructed in the same way.

Authors: S. Habib Mazharimousavi, M. Halilsoy

We consider Einstein-Maxwell-Dilaton (EMD) Lagrangian supplemented by double Liouville potentials to enrich our system and investigate the resulting dynamics. The general solution provides us alternative structures induced on the 3-dimensional domain wall (DW) moving in the 4-dimensional bulk. In particular, the local maximum in the potential suggests a maximum bounce (or onset for a contraction phase) of the 3-dimensional Friedmann-Robertson-Walker (FRW) universe on the DW. Depending on the choice of parameters we plot various cases of physical interest.

Authors: Loriano Bonora, Maro Cvitan, Predrag Dominis Prester, Silvio Pallua, Ivica Smolić

We show that for general spherically symmetric configurations, contributions of general gravitational and mixed gauge-gravitational Chern-Simons terms to the equations of motion vanish identically in $D>3$ dimensions. This implies that such terms in the action do not affect Birkhoff's theorem or any previously known spherically symmetric solutions. Furthermore, we investigate the thermodynamical properties using the procedure described in an accompanying paper. We find that in $D>3$ static spherically symmetric case Chern-Simons terms do not contribute to the entropy either. Moreover, if one requires only for the metric tensor to be spherically symmetric, letting other fields unrestricted, the results extend almost completely, with only one possible exception --- Chern-Simons Lagrangian terms in which the gravitational part is just the $n=2$ irreducible gravitational Chern-Simons term.

Authors: Pankaj Jain, Purnendu Karmakar, Subhadip Mitra, Sukanta Panda, Naveen K. Singh

We consider a model for gravity that is invariant under global scale transformations. It includes one extra real scalar field coupled non-minimally to the gravity fields. In this model all the dimensionful parameters like the gravitational constant and the cosmological constant etc. are generated by a solution of the classical equations of motion which breaks scale invariance. In this paper we demonstrate the stability of such a solution against small perturbations in a flat FRW background by making a perturbative expansion around this solution and solving the resulting equations linear in the perturbations.

Authors: Vicente J. Bolós, David Klein

The expansion of space, and other geometric properties of cosmological models, can be studied using geometrically defined notions of relative velocity. In this paper, we consider test particles undergoing radial motion relative to comoving (geodesic) observers in Robertson-Walker cosmologies, whose scale factors are increasing functions of cosmological time. Analytical and numerical comparisons of the Fermi, kinematic, astrometric, and the spectroscopic relative velocities of test particles are given under general circumstances. Examples include recessional comoving test particles in the de Sitter universe, the radiation-dominated universe, and the matter-dominated universe. Three distinct coordinate charts, each with different notions of simultaneity, are employed in the calculations. It is shown that the astrometric relative velocity of a radially receding test particle cannot be superluminal in any expanding Robertson-Walker spacetime. However, necessary and sufficient conditions are given for the existence of superluminal Fermi speeds, and it is shown how the four concepts of relative velocity determine geometric properties of the spacetime.

Authors: Pablo Galaviz

We study the stability and chaos of three compact objects using post-Newtonian (PN) equations of motion derived from the Arnowitt-Deser-Misner-Hamiltonian formulation. We include terms up to 2.5 PN order in the orbital part and the leading order in spin corrections. We performed numerical simulations of a hierarchical configuration of three compact bodies in which a binary system is perturbed by a third, lighter body initially positioned far away from the binary. The relative importance of the different PN orders is examined. The basin boundary method and the computation of Lyapunov exponent were employed to analyze the stability and chaotic properties of the system. The 1 PN terms produced a small but noticeable change in the stability regions of the parameters considered. The inclusion of spin or gravitational radiation does not produced a significant change with respect to the inclusion of the 1 PN terms.

Authors: Michael Coughlin, Jan Harms

In this paper, we present a calculation of seismic scattering from irregular surface topography in the Born approximation. Based on US-wide topographic data, we investigate topographic scattering at specific sites to demonstrate its impact on Newtonian-noise estimation and subtraction for future gravitational-wave detectors. We find that topographic scattering at a comparatively flat site in Oregon would not pose any problems, whereas scattering at a second site in Montana leads to significant broadening of wave amplitudes in wavenumber space that would make Newtonian-noise subtraction very challenging. Therefore, it is shown that topographic scattering should be included as criterion in the site-selection process of future low-frequency gravitational-wave detectors.

Authors: Vladimir Chernov, Stefan Nemirovski

It is observed that on many 4-manifolds there is a unique smooth structure underlying a globally hyperbolic Lorentz metric. For instance, every contractible smooth 4-manifold admitting a globally hyperbolic Lorentz metric is diffeomorphic to the standard $\R^4$. Similarly, a smooth 4-manifold homeomorphic to the product of a closed oriented 3-manifold $N$ and $\R$ and admitting a globally hyperbolic Lorentz metric is in fact diffeomorphic to $N\times \R$. Thus one may speak of a censorship imposed by the global hyperbolicty assumption on the possible smooth structures on $(3+1)$-dimensional spacetimes.

Authors: Bert Schroer

Using recent results of advanced quantum field theory, we confute some of M. Duff's claims [arXiv:1112.0788] about string theory which he wrote as an invited paper to the project "Forty Years Of String Theory: Reflecting on the Foundations"

Authors: M. De Laurentis, S. Capozziello

We review black hole solutions and self-gravitating structures in f(R)-gravity.