We show a new class of interaction terms with higher derivatives that can be added to every low derivative real scalar, such that the theory is degenerate, and the equation of motion remains of second order. In contrast to previous setups, the necessary constraints that eliminate the ghosts also have a clear physical motivation: they impose and preserve at all times the low derivative dynamics of the real scalar as a background, on top of which, the fluctuations induced by these higher derivative terms are degenerate, and ghost-free. We summarize the setup for these constrained ghost-free real scalars in a two-step prescription. In contrast to some models with first-order derivative interactions with applications for dark energy and inflation, these theories with necessarily constrained second-order derivative self-interactions do not modify the speed of propagation, neither the cone of influence for the field equations, which are prescribed by the low derivative background that is also essential to eliminate the ghost; hence, avoiding the potential superluminality issues of the former.
In this paper we formulate RFDiff invariant f(R) Horava-Lifshitz gravity and we show that it is related to the ghost condensation in the projectable version of Horava-Lifshitz gravity.
Motivated by the ghost condensate model, we study the Randall-Sundrum (RS) brane-world with an arbitrary function of the higher derivative kinetic terms, $\mathcal{P}(X)$, where $X=-(\nabla ϕ)^{2}$. The five-dimensional Einstein equations reduce to two equations of motion with a constraint between $\mathcal{P}(X)$ and the five-dimensional cosmological constant on the brane. For a static extra dimension, $\mathcal{P}(X)$ has solutions for both a negative kinetic scalar (so called {\textit{ghost}}) as well as an ordinary scalar field. However ghost condensation cannot take place. We show that sm…
Recent work claimed that the off-diagonal gluons (and ghosts) in pure Yang-Mills theories, with Maximal Abelian gauge fixing (MAG), attain a dynamical mass through an off-diagonal ghost condensate. This condensation takes place due to a quartic ghost interaction, unavoidably present in MAG for renormalizability purposes. The off-diagonal mass can be seen as evidence for Abelian dominance. We discuss why ghost condensation of the type discussed in those works cannot be the reason for the off-diagonal mass and Abelian dominance, since it results in a tachyonic mass. We also point out what the fu…
In the framework of the formalism of Cornwall et all. for composite operators I study the ghost-antighost condensation in SU(2) Yang-Mills theories quantized in the Maximal Abelian Gauge and I derive analytically a condensating effective potential at two ghost loops. I find that in this approximation the one loop pairing ghost-antighost is not destroyed but no mass is generated if the ansatz for the propagator suggested by the tree level Hubbard-Stratonovich transformations is used.
Motivated by ideas obtained from both ghost condensation and gravitational Higgs mechanism, we attempt to find classical solutions in the unitary gauge in general ghost condensation models. It is shown that depending on the form of scalar fields in an action, there are three kinds of exact solutions, which are (anti-) de Sitter space-time, polynomially expanding universes and flat Minkowski space-time. We briefly comment on gravitational Higgs mechanism in these models where we have massive gravitons of 5 degrees of freedom and 1 unitary scalar field (Nambu-Goldstone boson) after spontaneous s…
Assuming the existence of a scalar field which undergoes "ghost condensation" and which has a suitably chosen potential, it is possible to obtain a non-singular bouncing cosmology in the presence of regular matter and radiation. The potential for the ghost condensate field can be chosen such that the cosmological bounce is stable against the presence of anisotropic stress. Cosmological fluctuations on long wavelengths relevant to current cosmological observations pass through the bounce unaffected by the new physics which yields the bounce. Thus, this model allows for the realization of the "m…
We argue that the BRST and the anti-BRST super symmetries in the four-dimensional Yang-Mills theory can be spontaneously broken in a nonlinear partial gauge due to ghost-anti-ghost condensation. However, we show that the spontaneous BRST symmetry breaking can be avoided if we adopt the modified Maximal Abelian gauge which is an orthosymplectic $OSp(4|2)$ invariant renormalizable gauge proposed by the author to derive quark confinement. We compare the Maximal Abelian gauge with the conventional $OSp(4|2)$ invariant gauge proposed by Delbourgo-Jarvis and Baulieu-Thierry-Mieg. Finally, an implica…
The local action of an SU(2) gauge theory in general covariant Abelian gauges and the associated equivariant BRST symmetry that guarantees the perturbative renormalizability of the model are given. A global SL(2,R) symmetry of the model is spontaneously broken by ghost-antighost condensation at arbitrarily small coupling. This leads to propagators that are finite at Euclidean momenta for all elementary fields except the Abelian ``photon''. Ward Identities show that the symmetry breaking gives rise to massless BRST-quartets with ghost numbers (1,2,-2,-1) and (0,1,-1,0). The latter quartet is in…
A tachyon is considered to be sick in the context of particle mechanics, but in field theory just indicates instability of a background. We consider a similar possibility that a ghost in field theory might be just an indication of instability of a background and that it can condense to form a different background around which there is no ghost. We construct a low energy effective field theory based on the derivative expansion around the stable background. Possible applications are discussed, including dark energy, dark matter, inflation and black hole.
NSR superstring theory contains a tower of physical vertex operators (brane-like states) which exist at non-zero pictures only, i.e. are essentially mixed with superconformal ghosts. Some of these states are massless, they are responsible for creating D-branes. Other states are tachyonic (called ghost tachyons) creating a problem for the vacuum stability of the NSR model. In this paper we explore the role played by these tachyonic states in string dynamics. We show that the ghost tachyons condense on D-branes, created by massless brane-like states. Thus the vacuum stability is achieved dynamic…
In the setup of ghost condensation model the generalized second law of black hole thermodynamics can be respected under a radiatively stable assumption that couplings between the field responsible for ghost condensate and matter fields such as those in the Standard Model are suppressed by the Planck scale. Since not only black holes but also cosmology are expected to play important roles towards our better understanding of gravity, we consider a cosmological setup to test the theory of ghost condensation. In particular we shall show that the de Sitter entropy bound proposed by Arkani-Hamed, et…
We propose a theoretically consistent modification of gravity in the infrared, which is compatible with all current experimental observations. This is an analog of Higgs mechanism in general relativity, and can be thought of as arising from ghost condensation--a background where a scalar field ϕhas a constant velocity, <\dotϕ> = M^2. The ghost condensate is a new kind of fluid that can fill the universe, which has the same equation of state, ρ= -p, as a cosmological constant, and can hence drive de Sitter expansion of the universe. However, unlike a cosmological constant, it is a physical flui…
We show that cosmological acceleration, Dark Energy (DE) effect is a consequence of the zero rest mass, conformal non-invariance of gravitons, and 1-loop finiteness of quantum gravity (QG). The effect is due to graviton-ghost condensates arising from the interference of quantum coherent states. The theory is constructed as follows: Faddeev-Popov-De Witt gauged path integral -> factorization of classical and quantum variables -> transition to the 1-loop approximation -> choice of ghost sector, satisfying 1-loop finiteness of the theory off the mass shell. The Bogolyubov-Born-Green-Kirckwood-Yvo…
We analyze the ghost condensates <f^{abc}c^{b}c^{c}>, <f^{abc}\oc^{b}\oc^{c}> and <f^{abc}\oc^{b}c^{c}> in Yang-Mills theory in the Curci-Ferrari gauge. By combining the local composite operator formalism with the algebraic renormalization technique, we are able to give a simultaneous discussion of <f^{abc}c^{b}c^{c}>, <f^{abc}\oc^{b}\oc^{c}> and <f^{abc}\oc^{b}c^{c}>, which can be seen as playing the role of the BCS, respectively Overhauser effect in ordinary superconductivity. The Curci-Ferrari gauge exhibits a global continuous symmetry generated by the Nakanishi-Ojima (NO) algebra. This al…
We discuss a special class of quantum gravity phenomena that occur on the scale of the Universe as a whole at any stage of its evolution. These phenomena are a direct consequence of the zero rest mass of gravitons, conformal non-invariance of the graviton field, and one-loop finiteness of quantum gravity. The effects are due to graviton-ghost condensates arising from the interference of quantum coherent states. Each of coherent states is a state of gravitons and ghosts of a wavelength of the order of the horizon scale and of different occupation numbers. The state vector of the Universe is a c…
We perform a numerical study of ghost condensation -- in the so-called Overhauser channel -- for SU(2) lattice gauge theory in minimal Landau gauge. The off-diagonal components of the momentum-space ghost propagator G^{cd}(p) are evaluated for lattice volumes V = 8^4, 12^4, 16^4, 20^4, 24^4 and for three values of the lattice coupling: β= 2.2, 2.3, 2.4. Our data show that the quantity ϕ^b(p) = ε^{bcd} G^{cd}(p) / 2 is zero within error bars, being characterized by very large statistical fluctuations. On the contrary, |ϕ^b(p)| has relatively small error bars and behaves at small momenta as L^{-…
The effect of the Gribov horizon in Euclidean $SU(2)$ gauge theory is studied. Gauge fields on the Gribov horizon yield zero modes of ghosts and anti-ghosts. We show these zero modes can produce additional ghost interactions, and the Landau gauge changes to a nonlinear gauge effectively. In the infrared limit, however, the Landau gauge is recovered, and ghost zero modes may appear again. We show ghost condensation happens in the nonlinear gauge, and the zero mode repetition is avoided.
Euclidean $SU(2)$ gauge theory is studied in a nonlinear gauge. In this theory, ghost condensation happens and gauge fields acquire tachyonic masses. It is shown that these tachyonic masses are removed by a gauge field condensate $\langle A_μ^+A_μ^-\rangle$. Because of the ghost condensation, monopole solutions are included naturally. We find the condensate $\langle A_μ^+A_μ^-\rangle$ makes the magnetic potential massive.
The phase structure and the infrared behaviour of the Euclidean 3-dimensional $O(2)$ symmetric ghost scalar field model with higher-order derivative term has been investigated in Wegner and Houghton's renormalization group framework. The symmetric phase in which no ghost condensation occurs and the phase with restored symmetry but with a transient presence of a ghost condensate have been identified. Finiteness of the correlation length at the phase boundary hints to a phase transition of first order. The results are compared with those for the ordinary $O(2)$ symmetric scalar field model.
We show that off-diagonal gluons and off-diagonal ghosts acquire their masses dynamically in QCD if the maximal Abelian gauge is adopted. This result strongly supports the Abelian dominance in low-energy region of QCD. The mass generation is shown to occur due to ghost-anti-ghost condensation caused by attractive quartic ghost interactions within the Abelian projected effective gauge theory (derived by one of the authors). In fact, the quartic ghost interaction is indispensable for the renormalizability due to nonlinearity of the maximal Abelian gauge. The ghost-anti-ghost condensation is asso…
We study the physical propagating modes in a massive gravity model in curved cosmological backgrounds, which we have found as classical solutions in our previous paper. We show that, generically, there exist such the cosmological background solutions consistent with the equations of motion where we assume the ghost condensation ansatzes. Using the (1+3)-parametrization of the metric fluctuations with 'unitary' gauge, we find that there is neither a scalar ghost nor a tachyon in the spectrum of the propagating modes, the tensor modes become massive owing to gravitational Higgs mechanism, and th…
We revisit ghost dark matter, the possibility that ghost condensation may serve as an alternative to dark matter. In particular, we investigate the Friedmann-Robertson-Walker (FRW) background evolution and the large-scale structure (LSS) in the $Λ$GDM universe, i.e. a late-time universe dominated by a cosmological constant and ghost dark matter. The FRW background of the $Λ$GDM universe is indistinguishable from that of the standard $Λ$CDM universe if $M\gtrsim 1 {\rm eV}$, where $M$ is the scale of spontaneous Lorentz breaking. From the LSS we find a stronger bound: $M\gtrsim 10 {\rm eV}$. Fo…
We investigate the infrared (strong-coupling) regime of SU(N)-Yang-Mills theory on a self-dual background. We present an evaluation of the full effective potential for the field strength invariant F_{μν}F^{μν} from non-perturbative gauge correlation functions and find a non-trivial minimum corresponding to the existence of a dimension four gluon condensate in the vacuum. We also relate the infrared asymptotic form of the beta function of the running background-gauge coupling to the asymptotic behavior of Landau-gauge gluon and ghost propagators. Consistency between both gauges in the infrared …
We investigate a generic quadratic higher-order scalar-tensor theory with a scordatura term, which is expected to provide a consistent perturbative description of stealth solutions with a timelike scalar field profile. In the DHOST subclass, exactly stealth solutions are known to yield perturbations infinitely strongly coupled and thus cannot be trusted. Beyond DHOST theories with the scordatura term, such as in ghost condensation and U-DHOST, we show that stealth configurations cannot be realized as exact solutions but those theories instead admit approximately stealth solutions where the dev…
