The Kantowski-Sachs cosmological model sourced by a Skyrme field and a cosmological constant is considered in the framework of General Relativity. Assuming a constant radial profile function for the hedgehog ansatz, the Skyrme contribution to Einstei
n equations is shown to be equivalent to an anisotropic fluid. Using dynamical system techniques, a qualitative analysis of the cosmological equations is presented. Physically interesting features of the model such as isotropization, bounce and recollapse are discussed.
The effects of Horava-Lifshitz corrections to the gravito-magnetic field are analyzed. Solutions in the weak field, slow motion limit, referring to the motion of a satellite around the Earth are considered. The post-newtonian paradigm is used to eval
uate constraints on the Horava-Lifshitz parameter space from current satellite and terrestrial experiments data. In particular, we focus on GRAVITY PROBE B, LAGEOS and the more recent LARES mission, as well as a forthcoming terrestrial project, GINGER.
We consider static cosmological solutions along with their stability properties in the framework of a recently proposed theory of massive gravity. We show that the modifcation introduced in the cosmological equations leads to several new solutions, o
nly sourced by a perfect fluid, generalizing the Einstein Static Universe found in General Relativity. Using dynamical system techniques and numerical analysis, we show that the found solutions can be either neutrally stable or unstable against spatially homogeneous and isotropic perturbations.
We consider holographic cosmological models of dark energy in which the infrared cutoff is set by the Hubbles radius. We show that any interacting dark energy model with a matter like term able to alleviate the coincidence problem (i.e., with a posit
ive interaction term, regardless of its detailed form) can be recast as a noninteracting model in which the holographic parameter evolves slowly with time. Two specific cases are analyzed. First, the interacting model presented in [1] is considered, and its corresponding noninteracting version found. Then, a new noninteracting model, with a specific expression of the time-dependent holographic parameter, is proposed and analyzed along with its corresponding interacting version. We constrain the parameters of both models using observational data, and show that they can be told apart at the perturbative level.
We present an analytic study of the Potts model partition function on two different types of self-similar lattices of triangular shape with non integer Hausdorff dimension. Both types of lattices analyzed here are interesting examples of non-trivial
thermodynamics in less than two dimensions. First, the Sierpinski gasket is considered. It is shown that, by introducing suitable geometric coefficients, it is possible to reduce the computation of the partition function to a dynamical system, whose variables are directly connected to (the arising of) frustration on macroscopic scales, and to determine the possible phases of the system. The same method is then used to analyse the Hanoi graph. Again, dynamical system theory provides a very elegant way to determine the phase diagram of the system. Then, exploiting the analysis of the basins of attractions of the corresponding dynamical systems, we construct various examples of self-similar lattices with more than one critical temperature. These multiple critical temperatures correspond to crossing phases with different degrees of frustration.
The stability properties of the Einstein Static solution of General Relativity are altered when corrective terms arising from modification of the underlying gravitational theory appear in the cosmological equations. In this paper the existence and st
ability of static solutions are considered in the framework of two recently proposed quantum gravity models. The previously known analysis of the Einstein Static solutions in the semiclassical regime of Loop Quantum Cosmology with modifications to the gravitational sector is extended to open cosmological models where a static neutrally stable solution is found. A similar analysis is also performed in the framework of Horava-Lifshitz gravity under detailed balance and projectability conditions. In the case of open cosmological models the two solutions found can be either unstable or neutrally stable according with the admitted values of the parameters.
