Tachyonic Braneworld Research Articles

Localization of Elko spinor fields in tachyonic de Sitter braneworld models

In this paper, we investigate the localization of a five-dimensional (5D) Elko spinor field in de Sitter tachyonic braneworld models. These branes are generated by gravity coupled to a tachyonic bulk scalar field and include a de Sitter cosmological background induced on the 3D-brane. Using Yukawa-type coupling mechanism we show that a free massless Elko spinor field cannot be localized on tachyonic de Sitter branes while massive Elko fields are localized if their bulk mass obeys an upper bound. Also by introducing a tachyonic function F(T) as Yukawa interaction term between the Elko spinor and the background tachyonic scalar field we find that localized massless zero modes are given in terms of general Heun functions. Furthermore, it is shown that employing a new derivative coupling term in the action of Elko spinor fields leads to the Elko field localization on tachyonic de Sitter branes.

Configurational entropy and instability of tachyonic braneworld

We consider tachyonic braneworld with a bulk cosmological constant and investigate a configurational entropy of various magnitudes of scale factor. It is found that for a bulk negative/zero cosmological constant, the configurational entropy has a global minimum when the magnitude of scale factor reaches the critical value. This result seems to have intriguing implications such that an accelerated rate of the universe and cosmological inflation rate for radiation/matter domination are able to be determined by such critical value. We also find that the configurational entropy almost monotonically decreases for a bulk positive cosmological constant as the magnitude of scale factor grows up. We find an exact solution of tachyonic braneworld in a bulk de Sitter space. It is shown that such system under scalar perturbations is stable for some constraint relation. Furthermore, we also find that tachyonic braneworld model with a bulk negative/zero cosmological constant is always stable under scalar perturbations.

A de Sitter tachyonic braneworld revisited

Within the framework of braneworlds, several interesting physical effects can be described in a wide range of energy scales, starting from high-energy physics to cosmology and low-energy physics. An usual way to generate a thick braneworld model relies in coupling a bulk scalar field to higher dimensional warped gravity. Quite recently, a novel braneworld was generated with the aid of a tachyonic bulk scalar field, having several remarkable properties. It comprises a regular and stable solution that contains a relevant 3-brane with de Sitter induced metric, arising as an exact solution to the 5D field equations, describing the inflationary eras of our Universe. Besides, it is asymptotically flat, despite of the presence of a negative 5D cosmological constant, which is an interesting feature that contrasts with most of the known, asymptotically either dS or AdS models. Moreover, it encompasses a graviton spectrum with a single massless bound state, accounting for 4D gravity localized on the brane, separated from the continuum of Kaluza-Klein massive graviton modes by a mass gap that makes the 5D corrections to Newton's law to decay exponentially. Finally, gauge, scalar and fermion fields are also shown to be localized on this braneworld. In this work, we show that this tachyonic braneworld allows for a nontrivial solution with a vanishing 5D cosmological constant that preserves all the above mentioned remarkable properties with a less amount of parameters, constituting an important contribution to the construction of a realistic cosmological braneworld model.

Coulomb's law corrections and fermion field localization in a tachyonic de Sitter thick braneworld

Following recent studies which show that it is possible to localize gravity as well as scalar and gauge vector fields in a tachyonic de Sitter thick braneworld, we investigate the solution of the gauge hierarchy problem, the localization of fermion fields in this model, the recovering of the Coulomb law on the non-relativistic limit of the Yukawa interaction between bulk fermions and gauge bosons localized in the brane, and confront the predicted 5D corrections to the photon mass with its upper experimental/observational bounds, finding the model physically viable since it passes these tests. In order to achieve the latter aims we first consider the Yukawa interaction term between the fermionic and the tachyonic scalar fields MF(T)ΨΨ̅ in the action and analyze four distinct tachyonic functions F(T) that lead to four different structures of the respective fermionic mass spectra with different physics. In particular, localization of the massless left-chiral fermion zero mode is possible for three of these cases. We further analyze the phenomenology of these Yukawa interactions among fermion fields and gauge bosons localized on the brane and obtain the crucial and necessary information to compute the corrections to Coulomb's law coming from massive KK vector modes in the non-relativistic limit. These corrections are exponentially suppressed due to the presence of the mass gap in the mass spectrum of the bulk gauge vector field. From our results we conclude that corrections to Coulomb's law in the thin brane limit have the same form (up to a numerical factor) as far as the left-chiral massless fermion field is localized on the brane. Finally we compute the corrections to the Coulomb's law for an arbitrarily thick brane scenario which can be interpreted as 5D corrections to the photon mass. By performing consistent estimations with brane phenomenology, we found that the predicted corrections to the photon mass, which are well bounded by the experimentally observed or astrophysically inferred photon mass, are far beyond its upper bound, positively testing the viability of our tachyonic braneworld. Moreover, the 5D parameters that define these corrections possess the same order, providing naturalness to our model, however, a fine-tuning between them is needed in order to fit the corresponding upper bound on the photon mass.

Stability of a tachyon braneworld

Within the braneworld paradigm the tachyonic scalar field has been used to generate models that attempt to solve some of the open problems that physics faces nowadays, both in cosmology and high energy physics as well. When these field configurations are produced by the interplay of higher dimensional warped gravity with some matter content, braneworld models must prove to be stable under the whole set of small fluctuations of the gravitational and matter fields background, among other consistency tests. Here we present a complete proof of the stability under scalar perturbations of tachyonic thick braneworlds with an embedded maximally symmetric 4D space-time, revealing its physical consistency. This family of models contains a recently reported tachyonic de Sitter thick braneworld which possesses a series of appealing properties. These features encompass complete regularity, asymptotic flatness (instead of being asymptotically dS or AdS) even when it contains a negative bulk cosmological constant, a relevant 3-brane with dS metric which naturally arises from the full set of field equations of the 5D background (it is not imposed), qualitatively describing the inflationary epochs of our Universe, and a graviton spectrum with a single zero mode bound state that accounts for the 4D graviton localised on the brane and is separated from the continuum of Kaluza-Klein massive graviton excitations by a mass gap. The presence of this mass gap in the graviton spectrum makes the extra-dimensional corrections to Newton's law decay exponentially. Gauge vector fields with a single massless bound state in its mass spectrum are also localised on this braneworld model a fact that allows us to recover the Coulomb's law of our 4D world. All these properties of the above referred tachyonic braneworld together with the positive stability analysis provided in this work, constitute a firm step towards the construction of realistic cosmological models within the braneworld paradigm.

On localization of universal scalar fields in a tachyonic de Sitter thick braneworld

Braneworld models may yield interesting effects ranging from high-energy physics to cosmology, or even some low-energy physics. Their mode structure modifies standard results in these physical realms that can be tested and used to set bounds on the models parameters. Now, to define braneworld deviations from standard 4D physics, a notion of matter and gravity localization on the brane is crucial. In this work we investigate the localization of universal massive scalar fields in a de Sitter thick tachyonic braneworld generated by gravity coupled to a tachyonic bulk scalar field. This braneworld possesses a 4D de Sitter induced metric and is asymptotically flat despite the presence of a negative bulk cosmological constant, a novel and interesting peculiarity that contrasts with previously known models. Universal scalar fields can be localized in this expanding braneworld if their bulk mass obeys an upper bound, otherwise they delocalize: The dynamics of the scalar field is governed by a Schroedinger equation with an analog quantum mechanical potential of modified Poeschl-Teller type that depends on the bulk curvature of the braneworld system and the value of the bulk scalar field mass. For masses satisfying a certain upper bound, the potential displays a negative minimum and possesses a single massless bound state separated from the Kaluza-Klein (KK) massive modes by a mass gap defined by the Hubble (expansion scale) parameter of the 3-brane. As the bulk scalar field mass increases, the minimum of the quantum mechanical potential approaches a null value and, eventually, it becomes positive, transforming into a potential barrier and leading to delocalization of the bulk scalar field from the brane. The general solution of the Schroedinger equation is given in terms of general Heun functions, giving rise to a new application of these special functions.

Localization of gauge fields in a tachyonic de Sitter thick braneworld

In this work we show that universal gauge vector fields can be localized on the recently proposed 5D thick tachyonic braneworld which involves a de Sitter cosmological background induced on the 3-brane. Namely, by performing a suitable decomposition of the vector field, the resulting 4D effective action corresponds to a massive gauge field, while the profile along the extra dimension obeys a Schroedinger-like equation with a Poeschl-Teller potential. It turns out that the massless zero mode of the gauge field is bound to the expanding 3-brane and allows us to recover the standard 4D electromagnetic phenomena of our world. Moreover, this zero mode is separated from the continuum of Kaluza-Klein (KK) modes by a mass gap determined by the scale of the expansion parameter. We also were able to analytically solve the corresponding Schroedinger-like equation for arbitrary mass, showing that KK massive modes asymptotically behave like plane waves as expected.

On gravity localization in scalar braneworlds with a super-exponential warp factor

We show that within tachyonic braneworld models,"super-exponential" warp factors of the form $e^{-2f} \sim e^{-2c_1e^{c_2 |\sigma|}}$ are problematic when dealing with both the finiteness of the effective four-dimensional (4d) Planck mass and the localization of 4d gravity, which can be stated by the requirement that $\int e^{-2f(\sigma)}d\sigma < \infty$, because this condition necessarily implies that c_1 and c_2 should be positive. As a consequence of this fact the tachyonic field $T$ turns out to be complex in contradiction with the real nature of the starting action for the tachyonic braneworld. Conversely if one requires to have a real tachyon field, 4d gravity will not be localized and the effective gravitational coupling will be infinite. We present several typical examples where this problem occurs: we have analysed this situation for thin as well as thick tachyonic braneworlds with 4d Poincare symmetry, for the case when a bulk cosmological constant is present, and even for a brane with an induced spatially flat 4d cosmological background, and shown that in all cases the tachyon field T comes out to be inconsistently complex when imposing localization of 4d gravity. On the other hand, when dealing with a further reduction of the hierarchy problem one should carefully consider the sign of the constants c_1 and c_2 to avoid inconsistencies in the tachyonic braneworld model. We also present a similar discusion involving a canonical scalar field in the bulk where none of these problems arise and hence, the mass hierarchy and 4d gravity localization problems can be successfully addressed at once. Finally, the stability analysis of this scalar tensor braneworld model with a super-exponential warp factor is performed.

Publisher’s Note: Curvaton reheating in tachyonic braneworld inflation [Phys. Rev. D72, 083515 (2005)

Publisher’s Note: Curvaton reheating in tachyonic braneworld inflation [Phys. Rev. D<b>72</b>, 083515 (2005)

Curvaton reheating in tachyonic braneworld inflation

The curvaton reheating in a tachyonic braneworld inflationary universe model with an exponential potential is studied. We have found that the energy density in the kinetic epoch, has a complicated dependencies of the scale factor. For different scenarios the temperature of reheating is computed, finding an upper limit that lies in the range $10^{14}$--$10^{16}$GeV.