Title

Predictions and Observations in Theories with Varying Couplings

Author(s)/Creator(s)

Christian Armendariz-Picon, Department of Physics, Syracuse University, Syracuse, NYFollow

Document Type

Article

Date

5-13-2002

Language

English

Disciplines

Physics

Description/Abstract

We consider a toy universe containing conventional matter and an additional real scalar field, and discuss how the requirements of gauge and diffeomorphism invariance essentially single out a particular set of theories which might describe such a world at low energies. In these theories, fermion masses and g-factors, as well as the electromagnetic coupling turn to be scalar field dependent; fermion charges and the gravitational coupling might be assumed to be constant. We then proceed to study the impact of a time variation of the scalar field on measurements of atomic spectra at high redshifts. Light propagation is not affected by a sufficiently slow change of the fine structure constant, but changes of the latter as well as variations of fermion masses and g-factors do affect the observed atomic spectra. Finally, we prove the independence of these predictions on the chosen conformal frame, in a further attempt to address differing views about the subject expressed in the literature.

Additional Information

19 pages, no figures; uses RevTeX4 More information at http://arxiv.org/abs/astro-ph/0205187

Recommended Citation

Armendariz-Picon, Christian, "Predictions and Observations in Theories with Varying Couplings" (2002). Physics - All Scholarship. 232.
https://surface.syr.edu/phy/232

Source

Harvested from Arxiv.org