No Arabic abstract
We analyse the emergent cosmological dynamics corresponding to the mean field hydrodynamics of quantum gravity condensates, in the tensorial group field theory formalism. We focus in particular on the cosmological effects of fundamental interactions, and on the contributions from different quantum geometric modes. The general consequence of such interactions is to produce an accelerated expansion of the universe, which can happen both at early times, after the quantum bounce predicted by the model, and at late times. Our main result is that, while this fails to give a compelling inflationary scenario in the early universe, it produces naturally a phantom-like dark energy dynamics at late times, compatible with cosmological observations. By recasting the emergent cosmological dynamics in terms of an effective equation of state, we show that it can generically cross the phantom divide, purely out of quantum gravity effects without the need of any additional phantom matter. Furthermore, we show that the dynamics avoids any Big Rip singularity, approaching instead a de Sitter universe asymptotically.
We derive the Shafieloo, Hazra, Sahni and Starobinsky (SHSS) phenomenological formula for the radioactive-like decay of metastable dark energy directly from the quantum mechanics principles. For this aim we use the Fock-Krylov theory of quantum unstable states. We obtain deeper insight on the decay process as having three basic phases: the phase of radioactive decay, the next phase of damping oscillations, and finally the phase of power law decaying. We consider the cosmological model with matter and dark energy in the form of decaying metastable dark energy and study its dynamics in the framework of non-conservative cosmology with an interacting term determined by the running cosmological parameter. We study cosmological implications of metastable dark energy and estimate the characteristic time of ending of the radioactive-like decay epoch as 22296 of the present age of the Universe. We also confront the model with astronomical data which show that the model is in good agreement with the observations. Our general conclusion is that we are living in the epoch of the radioactive-like decay of metastable dark energy which is a relict of the quantum age of the Universe.
Quantum gravity of a brane-like Universe is formulated, and its Einstein limit is approached. Regge-Teitelboim embedding of Arnowitt-Deser-Misner formalism is carried out. Invoking a novel Lagrange multiplier, accompanying the lapse function and the shift vector, we derive the quadratic Hamiltonian and the corresponding bifurcated Wheeler-Dewitt-like equation. The inclusion of arbitrary matter resembles minimal coupling.
We suggest a Lorentz non-invariant generalization of the unimodular gravity theory, which is classically equivalent to general relativity with a locally inert (devoid of local degrees of freedom) perfect fluid having an equation of state with a constant parameter $w$. For the range of $w$ near $-1$ this dark fluid can play the role of dark energy, while for $w=0$ this dark dust admits spatial inhomogeneities and can be interpreted as dark matter. We discuss possible implications of this model in the cosmological initial conditions problem. In particular, this is the extension of known microcanonical density matrix predictions for the initial quantum state of the closed cosmology to the case of spatially open Universe, based on the imitation of the spatial curvature by the dark fluid density. We also briefly discuss quantization of this model necessarily involving the method of gauge systems with reducible constraints and the effect of this method on the treatment of recently suggested mechanism of vacuum energy sequestering.
Adopting Diracs brane variation prescription, the energy-momentum tensor of a brane gets supplemented by a geometrical (embedding originated) dark component. While the masslessness of the graviton is preserved, and the Newton force law is recovered, the corresponding Newton constant is necessarily lower than the one which governs FRW cosmology. This has the potential to puzzle out cosmological dark matter, a subsequent conjecture concerning galactic dark matter follows.
I discuss the dark energy characterized by the violation of the null energy condition ($varrho + p geq 0$), dubbed phantom. Amazingly, it is admitted by the current astronomical data from supernovae. We discuss both classical and quantum cosmological models with phantom as a source of matter and present the phenomenon called phantom duality.