The so-called hybrid metric-Palatini theory of gravity (HMPG), proposed in 2012 by T. Harko et al., is known to successfully describe both local (solar-system) and cosmological observations. This paper gives a complete description of static, spherically vacuum solutions of HMPG in the simplest case where its scalar-tensor representation has a zero scalar field potential $V(ϕ)$, and both Riemannian ($R$) and Palatini ($\cal R$) Ricci scalars are zero. Such a scalar-tensor theory coincides with general relativity with a phantom conformally coupled scalar field as a source of gravity. Generic asymptotically flat solutions either contain naked central singularities or describe traversable wormholes, and there is a special two-parameter family of globally regular black hole solutions with extremal horizons. In addition, there is a one-parameter family of solutions with an infinite number of extremal horizons between static regions and a spherical radius monotonically changing from region to region. It is argued that the obtained black hole and wormhole solutions are unstable under monopole perturbations. As a by-product, it is shown that a scalar-tensor theory with $V(ϕ)=0$, in which there is at least one nontrivial ($ϕ\ne \rm const$) vacuum solution with $R\equiv 0$, necessarily reduces to a theory with a conformal scalar field (the latter may be usual or phantom).
We reconsider the problem of $f(R)$ theories of gravity coupled to Born-Infeld theory of electrodynamics formulated in a Palatini approach, where metric and connection are independent fields. By studying electrovacuum configurations in a static and spherically symmetric space-time, we find solutions which reduce to their Reissner-Nordström counterparts at large distances but undergo important non-perturbative modifications close to the center. Our new analysis reveals that the point-like singularity is replaced by a finite-size wormhole structure, which provides a geodesically complete and thu…
We study the classical Euclidean wormholes in the context of extended theories of gravity. With no loss of generality, we use the dynamical equivalence between $f(\tilde{R})$ gravity and scalar-tensor theories to construct a point-like Lagrangian in the flat FRW space time. We first show the dynamical equivalence between Palatini $f(\tilde{R})$ gravity and the Brans-Dicke theory with self-interacting potential, and then show the dynamical equivalence between the Brans-Dicke theory with self-interacting potential and the minimally coupled O'Hanlon theory. We show the existence of new Euclidean …
Wormholes are hypothetical shortcuts in spacetime that in General Relativity unavoidably violate all of the pointwise energy conditions. In this paper, we consider several wormhole spacetimes that, as opposed to the standard \emph{designer} procedure frequently employed in the literature, arise directly from gravitational actions including additional terms resulting from contractions of the Ricci tensor with the metric, and which are formulated assuming independence between metric and connection (Palatini approach). We reinterpret such wormhole solutions under the prism of General Relativity a…
In the frame work of Palatini approach to modified $f(R)$ theories of gravity, we attempt to investigate the thermodynamic behavior of time-dependent wormhole geometries. By considering an evolving wormhole spacetime, we find the field equations in Palatini $f(R)$ gravity. The energy density and pressure are redefined in order to satisfy the continuity equation. To discuss the thermodynamic behavior, an expression for the variation of total entropy is obtained. Then, we extend our discussions to apparent and event horizons of evolving wormholes. We employ the radius of apparent and event horiz…
In this work, we analyse the evolution of time-dependent traversable wormhole geometries in a Friedmann-Lemaître-Robertson-Walker background in the context of the scalar-tensor representation of hybrid metric-Palatini gravity. We deduce the energy-momentum profile of the matter threading the wormhole spacetime in terms of the background quantities, the scalar field, the scale factor and the shape function, and find specific wormhole solutions by considering a barotropic equation of state for the background matter. We find that particular cases satisfy the null and weak energy conditions for al…
Wormhole solutions in a generalized hybrid metric-Palatini matter theory, given by a gravitational Lagrangian $f\left(R,\cal{R}\right)$, where $R$ is the metric Ricci scalar, and $\mathcal{R}$ is a Palatini scalar curvature defined in terms of an independent connection, and a matter Lagrangian, are found. The solutions are worked in the scalar-tensor representation of the theory, where the Palatini field is traded for two scalars, $φ$ and $ψ$, and the gravitational term $R$ is maintained. The main interest in the solutions found is that the matter field obeys the null energy condition (NEC) ev…
Recently, a modified theory of gravity was presented, which consists of the superposition of the metric Einstein-Hilbert Lagrangian with an $f(\cal R)$ term constructed à la Palatini. The theory possesses extremely interesting features such as predicting the existence of a long-range scalar field, that explains the late-time cosmic acceleration and passes the local tests, even in the presence of a light scalar field. In this brief report, we consider the possibility that wormholes are supported by this hybrid metric-Palatini gravitational theory. We present here the general conditions for worm…
In this work, we explore the existence of traversable wormhole solutions supported by double gravitational layer thin-shells and satisfying the Null Energy Condition (NEC) throughout the whole spacetime, in a quadratic-linear form of the generalized hybrid metric-Palatini gravity. We start by showing that for a particular quadratic-linear form of the action, the junction conditions on the continuity of the Ricci scalar $R$ and the Palatini Ricci scalar $\mathcal R$ of the theory can be discarded without the appearance of undefined distribution terms in the field equations. As a consequence, a …
The hybrid metric-Palatini theory of gravity (HMPG), proposed in 2012 by T. Harko et al., is known to successfully describe both local (solar-system) and cosmological observations. We discuss static, spherically symmetric vacuum solutions of HMPG with the aid of its scalar-tensor representation. This scalar-tensor theory coincides with general relativity with a conformally coupled scalar field (which can be canonical or phantom), therefore the known solutions of this theory are re-interpreted in terms of HMPG. In particular, in the case of zero scalar field potential $V (ϕ)$, such that both Ri…
The dynamical generation of wormholes within an extension of General Relativity (GR) containing (Planck's scale-suppressed) Ricci-squared terms is considered. The theory is formulated assuming the metric and connection to be independent (Palatini formalism) and is probed using a charged null fluid as a matter source. This has the following effect: starting from Minkowski space, when the flux is active the metric becomes a charged Vaidya-type one, and once the flux is switched off the metric settles down into a static configuration such that far from the Planck scale the geometry is virtually i…
We study the structure and stability of traversable wormholes built as (spherically symmetric) thin shells in the context of Palatini $f(\mathcal{R})$ gravity. Using a suitable junction formalism for these theories we find that the effective number of degrees of freedom on the shell is reduced to a single one, which fixes the equation of state to be that of massless stress-energy fields, contrary to the general relativistic and metric $f(R)$ cases. Another major difference is that the surface energy density threading the thin-shell, needed in order to sustain the wormhole, can take any sign, a…
We consider static spherically symmetric stellar configurations in Palatini theories of gravity in which the Lagrangian is an unspecified function of the form f(R,R_{μν}R^{μν}). We obtain the Tolman-Oppenheimer-Volkov equations corresponding to this class of theories and show that they recover those of f(R) theories and General Relativity in the appropriate limits. We compute exterior vacuum solutions and comment on the possible expected modifications, as compared to GR, of the interior solutions.
We consider vacuum static spherically symmetric solutions in the hybrid metric-Palatini gravity theory, which is a combination of the metric and Palatini $f(R)$ formalisms unifying local constraints at the Solar System level and the late-time cosmic acceleration. We adopt the scalar-tensor representation of the hybrid metric-Palatini theory, in which the scalar-tensor definition of the potential can be represented as a Clairaut differential equation. Due to their mathematical complexity, it is difficult to find exact solutions of the vacuum field equations, and therefore we adopt a numerical a…
In this paper we investigate wormhole and spherically symmetric solutions in 4D gravity plus a matter source consisting of a ghost scalar field with a sine-Gordon potential. For the wormhole solutions we also include the possibility of electric and/or magnetic charges. For both types of solutions we perform a linear stability analysis and show that the wormhole solutions are stable and that when one turns on the electric and/or magnetic field the solution remains stable. The linear stability analysis of the spherically symmetric solutions indicates that they can be stable or unstable depending…
We consider the construction of generic spherically symmetric thin-shell traversable wormhole spacetimes in standard general relativity. By using the cut-and-paste procedure, we comprehensively analyze the stability of arbitrary spherically symmetric thin-shell wormholes to linearized spherically symmetric perturbations around static solutions. While a number of special cases have previously been dealt with in scattered parts of the literature, herein we take considerable effort to make the analysis as general and unified as practicable. We demonstrate in full generality that stability of the …
We compare cosmologic and spherically symmetric solutions to metric and Palatini versions of vector Horndeski theory. It appears that Palatini formulation of the theory admits more degrees of freedom. Specifically, homogeneous isotropic configuration is effectively bimetric, and static spherically symmetric configuration contains non-metric connection. In general, the exact solution in metric case coincides with the approximative solution in Palatini case. The Palatini version of the theory appears to be more complicated, but the resulting non-linearity may be useful: we demonstrate that it al…
The generalized hybrid metric-Palatini gravity is a theory of gravitation that has an action composed of a Lagrangian $f(R,\cal R)$, where $f$ is a function of the metric Ricci scalar $R$ and a new Ricci scalar $\cal R$ formed from a Palatini connection, plus a matter Lagrangian. This theory can be rewritten by trading the new geometric degrees of freedom of $f(R,\cal R)$ into two scalar fields, $φ$ and $ψ$, yielding an equivalent scalar-tensor theory. Given a spacetime theory, the next step is to find solutions. To construct solutions it is often necessary to know the junction conditions betw…
An introduction to extended theories of gravity formulated in metric-affine (or Palatini) spaces is presented. Focusing on spherically symmetric configurations with electric fields, we will see that in these theories the central singularity present in General Relativity is generically replaced by a wormhole structure. The resulting space-time becomes geodesically complete and, therefore, can be regarded as non-singular. We illustrate these properties considering two different models, namely, a quadratic $f(R)$ theory and a Born-Infeld like gravity theory.
The measurement of the epicyclic frequencies is a widely used astrophysical technique to infer information on a given self-gravitating system and on the related gravity background. We derive their explicit expressions in static and spherically symmetric wormhole spacetimes. We discuss how these theoretical results can be applied to: (1) detect the presence of a wormhole, distinguishing it by a black hole; (2) reconstruct wormhole solutions through the fit of the observational data, once we have them. Finally, we discuss the physical implications of our proposed epicyclic method.
The paper deals with static traversable wormhole having shape function a polynomial of the radial coordinate of degree 2. Embedding of the wormholes in space-time is examined both analytically and graphically. Also both timelike and null geodesics are studied in this wormhole geometry.
In this paper we study classical general relativistic static wormhole configurations with pseudo-spherical symmetry. We show that in addition to the hyperbolic wormhole solutions discussed by Lobo and Mimoso in the Ref. Phys.\ Rev.\ D {\bf 82}, 044034 (2010), there exists another wormhole class, which is truly pseudo-spherical counterpart of spherical Morris-Thorne wormhole (contrary to the Lobo-Mimoso wormhole class), since all constraints originally defined by Morris and Thorne for spherically symmetric wormholes are satisfied. We show that, for both classes of hyperbolic wormholes the energ…
We systematically investigate the microlensing effect of charged spherically symmetric wormhole, where the light source is remote from the throat. Remarkably, there will be at most three images by considering the charge part. We study all situations including three images, two images, and one image, respectively. The numerical result shows that the range of total magnification is from $10^5$ to $10^{-2}$ depending on various metrics. In the case of three images, there will be two maximal values of magnification (a peak, and a gentle peak) when the contribution via mass is much less than that o…
We study the geometry of a wormhole spacetime filled with anisotropic matter in the context of general relativity. In the course of the study, new static and spherically symmetric solutions, analytic and numerical ones, are found. We specify the existence condition for a wormhole throat. We analyze properties of the solutions after categorizing them based on the spacetime regularity and the signature of energy density. The necessary conditions which allow a wormhole spacetime to be nonsingular are described.
Recent work on an approach to the geometrodynamics of cylindrical gravity waves in the presence of interacting scalar matter fields, based on the Kuchař hypertime formalism, is extended to the analogous spherically symmetric system. This produces a geometrodynamical formalism for spherical black holes and wormholes in which the metric variables are divided into two classes, dynamical and redundant. The redundant variables measure the embedding of a spacelike hypersurface into the spacetime, and proper time in the asymptotically flat regions. All the constraints can be explicitly solved for the…
The stability of transparent spherically symmetric thin shells (and wormholes) to linearized spherically symmetric perturbations about static equilibrium is examined. This work generalizes and systematizes previous studies and explores the consequences of including the cosmological constant. The approach shows how the existence (or not) of a domain wall dominates the landscape of possible equilibrium configurations.
The present work is an attempt to find possible traversable wormhole solutions in static spherically symmetric space-time supported by anisotropic matter field. Part of the work could be considered as a generalization of the work in Phys. Lett. B 757 (2016), 130 in the sense that it extends the work done therein. The paper provides several examples of wormholes in anisotropic pressure and provides general mechanisms for finding them. Finally the work examines the energy conditions corresponding to suggested wormhole solutions.
We disclose remarkable features of the scalar-tensor theory with the derivative coupling of the scalar field to the curvature in the Palatini formalism. Using the disformal transformations, we show that this theory is free from Otrogradski ghosts. For a special relation between two coupling constants, it is disformally dual to the Einstein gravity minimally coupled to the scalar, which opens the way to constructing several exact solutions. The disformal transformation degenerates at the boundary of the physical region, near which the properties of desingularization are revealed, illustrated by…
In this article we obtain wormhole solutions in the recently proposed extension of symmetric teleparallel gravity called $f(Q,T)$ gravity. Here, the gravitational Lagrangian $L$ is defined by an arbitrary function $f$ of $Q$ and $T$ (where $Q$ is the non-metricity scalar, while $T$ is the trace of the energy-momentum tensor). In this study, we obtain the field equations for a static spherically symmetric wormhole metric in the context of a general $f(Q,T)$ gravity. We study the wormhole solutions with (i) linear EoS and (ii) anisotropy relation. We adopt two different forms of $f(Q,T)$ (a) lin…
In this paper we study static spherically symmetric wormhole solutions sustained by matter sources with isotropic pressure. We show that such spherical wormholes do not exist in the framework of zero-tidal-force wormholes. On the other hand, it is shown that for the often used power-law shape function there is no spherically symmetric traversable wormholes sustained by sources with a linear equation of state $p=ωρ$ for the isotropic pressure, independently of the form of the redshift function $ϕ(r)$. We consider a solution obtained by Tolman at 1939 for describing static spheres of isotropic f…
We investigate static spherically symmetric solutions in the Palatini kinetically coupled scalar-tensor theory, which reduces to gravity minimally coupled to a scalar field in Einstein frame. Using the fact that the Jordan and Einstein frame are related by a reversible disformal transformation, which can be solved in closed form, we derive the general solution in the Jordan frame and show that it does not contain black holes. There is a wormhole branch and a naked singularity branch between which lies a non-singular asymptotically flat solution with kernel $M_{1,1}\times S^2$. This theory stro…
Lightlike p-branes (LL-branes) with dynamical (variable) tension allow simple and elegant Polyakov-type and dual to it Nambu-Goto-like world-volume action formulations. Here we first briefly describe the dynamics of LL-branes as test objects in various physically interesting gravitational backgrounds of black hole type, including rotating ones. Next we show that LL-branes are the appropriate gravitational sources that provide proper matter energy momentum tensors in the Einstein equations of motion needed to generate traversable wormhole solutions, in particular, self-consistent cylindrical ro…
A Damour-Solodukhin wormhole with a metric which is similar to a Schwarzschild black hole seems to be a black hole mimicker since it is difficult to distinguish them by practical astrophysical observations. In this paper, we investigate a center-of-mass energy for the collision of two test particles in the Damour-Solodukhin wormhole spacetime. We show that the center-of-mass energy for the head-on collision of the particles is large if the difference between the metrics of the wormhole and the black hole is small. To deeply understand the high energy particle collision, we generalize the head-…
We study whether it is possible to design a "classical" spatially flat bouncing cosmology or a static, spherically symmetric asymptotically flat Lorentzian wormhole in cubic Galileon theories interacting with an extra scalar field. We show that bouncing models are always plagued with gradient instabilities, while there are always ghosts in wormhole backgrounds.
In this paper, we examine static spherically symmetric wormhole solutions in generalized $f(R,ϕ)$ gravity. To do this, we consider three different kinds of fluids: anisotropic, barotropic and isotropic. We explore different $f(R,ϕ)$ models and inspect the energy conditions for all of those three fluids. It is found that under some models in this theory, it is possible to obtain wormhole solutions without requiring exotic matter. The discussion about the conditions where the standard energy conditions (WEC and NEC) are valid for the fluids is discussed in details. From our results and for our c…
We consider a static spherically symmetric thin shell wormhole collides with another thin shell consisting of ordinary matter. By employing the geometrical constraint, which leads to the conservation of energy and momentum, we show that the state after the collision can be solved from the initial data. In the low speed approximation, the solutions are rather simple. The shell may either bounce back or pass through the wormhole. In either case, the wormhole shrinks right after the collision. In the "bouncing" case, a surprising result is that the radial speeds before and after the collision sat…
Charged black holes in gravity theories in the Palatini formalism present a number of unique properties. Their innermost structure is topologically nontrivial, representing a wormhole supported by a sourceless electric flux. For certain values of their effective mass and charge curvature divergences may be absent, and their event horizon may also disappear yielding a remnant. We give an overview of the mathematical derivation of these solutions and discuss their geodesic structure and other geometric properties.
The effect of the Gauss-Bonnet term on the existence and dynamical stability of thin-shell wormholes as negative tension branes is studied in the arbitrary dimensional spherically, planar, and hyperbolically symmetric spacetimes. We consider radial perturbations against the shell for the solutions which have the Z${}_2$ symmetry and admit the general relativistic limit. It is shown that the Gauss-Bonnet term shrinks the parameter region admitting static wormholes. The effect of the Gauss-Bonnet term on the stability depends on the spacetime symmetry. For planar symmetric wormholes, the Gauss-B…
In this work, we explore wormhole solutions in $f(R,T)$ theory of gravity, where $R$ is the scalar curvature and $T$ is the trace of stress-energy tensor of matter. To investigate this, we consider static spherically symmetric geometry with matter contents as anisotropic, isotropic and barotropic fluids in three separate cases. By taking into account Starobinsky $f(R)$ model , we analyze the behavior of energy conditions for these different kind of fluids. It is shown that the wormhole solutions can be constructed without exotic matter in few regions of spacetime. We also give the graphical il…
It is proved that all thin-shell wormholes built from two identical regions of vacuum static, spherically symmetric space-times have a negative shell surface energy density in any scalar-tensor theory of gravity with a non-ghost massless scalar field and a non-ghost graviton.
We study a static, spherically symmetric wormhole model whose metric coincides with that of the so-called Ellis wormhole but the material source of gravity consists of a perfect fluid with negative density and a source-free radial electric or magnetic field. For a certain class of fluid equations of state, it has been shown that this wormhole model is linearly stable under both spherically symmetric perturbations and axial perturbations of arbitrary multipolarity. A similar behavior is predicted for polar nonspherical perturbations. It thus seems to be the first example of a stable wormhole mo…
Non-vacuum static spherically-symmetric solutions in Palatini f(R) gravity are examined. It is shown that for generic choices of f(R), there are commonly-used equations of state for which no satisfactory physical solution of the field equations can be found within this framework, apart from in the special case of General Relativity, casting doubt on whether Palatini f(R) gravity can be considered as giving viable alternatives to General Relativity.
We derive the equations of motion of a test particle in the equatorial plane around a static and spherically symmetric wormhole influenced by a radiation field including the general relativistic Poynting-Robertson effect. From the analysis of this dynamical system, we develop a diagnostic to distinguish a black hole from a wormhole, which can be timely supported by several and different observational data. This procedure is based on the possibility of having some wormhole metrics, which smoothly connect to the Schwarzschild metric in a small transition surface layer very close to the black hol…
Wormholes may arise as solutions of extensions of General Relativity without violation of the energy conditions. Working in a Palatini approach we consider classical geometries supporting such wormholes. It is shown that the resulting space-times represent explicit realizations of the concept of geon introduced by Wheeler, interpreted as self-consistent bodies generated by an electromagnetic field without sources.
In this paper we present a detailed calculation of an Ansatz that allows to obtain spherically symmetric Einstein-Dirac configurations in $d$-dimensions. We show that this is possible by combining $2^{\lfloor \frac{d-2}{2} \rfloor}$ Dirac fields, making use of the properties of the angular dependence of the spinors in a spherical background. By applying this Ansatz, we investigate some simple analytical solutions. One of them is a regular wormhole supported by the Dirac fields. Other solutions include a pathological black hole and a naked singularity. We analyze the domain of existence and pro…
We consider the Horndeski theory in four-dimensional space-time. We show that this theory does not admit stable, static, spherically symmetric, asymptotically flat, Lorentzian wormholes.
This paper generalizes an earlier result by the author based on well-established embedding theorems that connect the classical theory of relativity to higher-dimensional spacetimes. In particular, an $n$-dimensional Riemannian space is said to be of embedding class $m$ if $m+n$ is the lowest dimension of the flat space in which the given space can be embedded. To study traversable wormholes, we concentrate on spacetimes that can be reduced to embedding class one by a suitable transformation. It is subsequently shown that the extra degrees of freedom from the embedding theory provide the basis …
We consider a spherically symmetric line element which admits either a black hole geometry or a wormhole geometry and show that in both cases the apparent horizon or the wormhole throat is partially characterized by the zero-set of a single curvature invariant. The detection of the apparent horizon by this invariant is consistent with the geometric horizon detection conjectures and implies that it is a geometric horizon of the black hole, while the detection of the wormhole throat presents a conceptual problem for the conjectures. To distinguish between these surfaces, we determine a set of cu…
We consider novel wormhole solutions supported by a matter content that minimally violates the null energy condition. More specifically, we consider an equation of state in which the sum of the energy density and radial pressure is proportional to a constant with a value smaller than that of the inverse area characterising the system, i.e., the area of the wormhole mouth. This approach is motivated by a recently proposed cosmological event, denoted "the little sibling of the big rip", where the Hubble rate and the scale factor blow up but the cosmic derivative of the Hubble rate does not [1]. …
We examine static spherically symmetric polytropic spheres in Palatini f(R) gravity and show that no regular solutions to the field equations exist for physically relevant cases such as a monatomic isentropic gas or a degenerate electron gas, thus casting doubt on the validity of Palatini f(R) gravity as an alternative to General Relativity.
