Cosmological Evolution of Degenerate Vacua

Oct 14, 1986
16 pages
Published in:
  • Nucl.Phys.B 282 (1987) 610-625
  • Published: 1987
Report number:
  • Print-86-1238 (CAMBRIDGE)

Citations per year

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Abstract: (Elsevier)
Currently interesting higher-dimensional theories have degenerate ground state spacetimes of the form Minkowski spacetime (M d ) times a compact space (B n ). The degeneracy arises because neither the size nor the shape of B n is determined by the classical field equations. The size and shape parameters define a moduli space and we show that all d -dimensional Friedmann-Robertson-Walker cosmologies correspond to geodesic motion in this moduli space. If the universe is open and expands forever, this motion is damped and at late times the D = ( d + n )-dimensional universe tends to M d × B n where the metric on B n is time independent. Inflation is not possible in scale invariant theories, but we indicate how a breakdown in scale invariance at the quantum level could lead to inflation. We also discuss some bizarre aspects of the global structure of some of the D -dimensional cosmologies.
  • COSMOLOGICAL MODEL
  • Kaluza-Klein model
  • SCALING: VIOLATION
  • FIELD THEORY: SPACE-TIME
  • FIELD THEORY: HIGHER-DIMENSIONAL
  • FIELD THEORY: compactification
  • BOUNDARY CONDITION
  • SUPERGRAVITY
  • MODEL: INFLATION