In a modest attempt to present potentially new paradigms in Cosmology, including its inflationary epoch, and initiate discussions, I review in this article some novel, string-inspired cosmological models, which entail a purely geometrical origin of the Dark sector of the Universe but also of its observed matter-antimatter asymmetry. The models contain gravitational (string-model independent, Kalb-Ramond (KR)) axion fields coupled to primordial gravitational anomalies via CP-violating interactions. The anomaly terms are four-space-time-dimensional remnants of the Green-Schwarz counterterms appearing in the definition of the field strength of the spin-one antisymmetric tensor field of the (bosonic) massless gravitational string multiplet, which also plays the rôle of a totally antisymmetric component of torsion. I show how in such cosmologies the presence of primordial gravitational waves can lead to anomaly condensates and dynamical inflation of a "running-vacuum-model" type, without external inflatons, but also to leptogenesis in the radiation era due to anomaly-induced Lorentz and CPT Violating KR axion backgrounds. I also discuss how the torsion-related KR-axion could acquire a mass during the QCD epoch, thus playing the role of (a component of) Dark Matter. Phenomenological considerations of the inflationary and post-inflationary (in particular, modern) eras of the model are briefly discussed, including its potential for alleviating the observed tensions in the cosmological data of the current epoch.
Regularization of quantum field theories introduces a mass scale which breaks axial rotational and scaling invariances. We demonstrate from first principles that axial torsion and torsion trace modes have non-transverse vacuum polarization tensors, and become massive as a result. The underlying reasons are similar to those responsible for the Adler-Bell-Jackiw (ABJ) and scaling anomalies. Since these are the only torsion components that can couple minimally to spin 1/2 particles, the anomalous generation of masses for these modes, naturally of the order of the regulator scale, may help to expl…
Using the Fujikawa and the heat-kernel methods we make a complete and detailed computation of the global, gauge and gravitational anomalies present in the Standard Model defined on a curved space time with torsion. We find new contributions coming from curvature and torsion terms to the leptonic number anomaly (so that $B-L$ is not conserved any more), to the $U(1)_Y$ gauge and to the mixed $U(1)_Y$-gravitational anomalies, but the gauge anomaly cancellation conditions on the hypercharges remain the same. We also find that the condition, usually related to the cancellation of the mixed $U(1)_Y…
Torsion appears in a natural way in modern formulations of the gravitational theories. In this work we study several aspects of the interplay between the Standard Model and a classical gravitational background with torsion. In particular we consider the problem of the gauge and gravitational anomalies, $B$ and $L$ anomalies, the effective action for the torsion and the propagation of electromagnetic radiation in the presence of torsion.
I review a string-inspired cosmological model, with gravitational anomalies present at very early epochs, which includes a totally antisymmetric torsion, that in (3+1)-dimensions is equivalent to a pseudoscalar (Kalb-Ramond, string-model independent) axion field. Upon condensation of primordial gravitational waves (GW), that are created at a pre-inflationary era, the model leads to inflation of the so-called running-vacuum-model (RVM) type, which is realised without the need for external inflaton fields, being due to the non-linearities that characterise the gravitational theory. The model pro…
Recently Salim et al [JCAP (2007)], have shown that galactic dynamo seeds can be possibly attainable in bouncing cosmological models with QED Lagrangeans. In this paper we generalise their result by include torsion of spacetime in bouncing cosmology. It is shown that by considering a semi-minimal photon-torsion coupling and a Lagrangean of the type $RF^{2}$ it is possible to find a fast decoupling between magnetic and torsion fields in the contracting phases of the universe. Besides torsion field decays as $K\sim{a^{2/3}}$ while the magnetic field grows as $B\sim{a^{-5.5}}$ thus explaining the…
Earlier de Sabbata and Gasperini have shown that neutrinos oscillation which gives them a mass can be induced by torsion. More recently Enqvist et al have shown that it is possible to use massive neutrinos BBN magnetic fields to seed galactic magnetic fields. Thus based on these previous investigations we present several examples of how obtaining cosmological magnetic seed fields as galactic magnetic fields from massive neutrino densities and also from the torsion obtained by Nitsch as $T\approx{10^{-24}s^{-1}}$ at the present day which yields magnetic seed field of the order of $B_{seed}\appr…
Relativistic gravitational anomalies lead to anomalous transport coefficients that can be activated at finite temperature in condensed matter systems with gapless fermions. The chiral vortical effect (CVE) is an anomalous chiral current along a rotation axis, expressed in terms of a gravimagnetic field and a gravitational anomaly. Another one, the chiral torsional effect (CTE), arises from hydrodynamically independent frame fields and connection. We discuss the relation of CVE, CTE and gravitational anomalies for relativistic fermions from the perspective of torsion and the Nieh-Yan anomaly. T…
Recently Kahniashivili et al (2006) presented a unified treatment for ultraviolet Lorentz violation (LV) testing through electromagnetic wave propagation in magnetised plasmas, based on dispersion and rotation measured data. Based on the fact discovered recently by Kostelecky et al (2008), that LV may place constraints on spacetime torsion, in this paper it is shown that on the limit of very low frequency torsion waves, it is possible to constraint torsion from Faraday rotation and CMB on a similar fashion as Minkowski spacetime plus torsion. Here the Maxwells modified equations are obtained b…
Cosmological magnetic helicity has been thought to be a fundamental agent for magnetic field amplification in the universe. More recently Semikoz and Sokoloff [Phys Rev Lett 92 (2004): 131.301.] showed that the weakness of the seed fields did not necessarily imply the weakness of magnetic cosmological helicity. In this paper we present a derivation of dynamo equation based upon the flat torsion photon non-minimal coupling through Riemann-Cartan spacetime. From this derivation one computes the necessary conditions for a flat torsion field to generate a galactic dynamo seed, from the cosmologica…
Recently much controversy has been shed on BICEP 2 experiments for the concerning this validity or not and a possible set of new experiments to detect primordial inflation and gravitational waves. Since gravitational waves imply the existence of primordial magnetic fields in this context, C Bonvin, R Durrer and R Marteens [Phys Rev Lett (2014)] have tried to associate the presence of primordial magnetic fields to BICEP 2 by making use of CMB tensor modes. Here we show that by considering torsion dilatonic lagrangean one obtains cosmological magnetic fields of the order of $B\sim{10^{-10}G}$ wh…
I review a (3+1)-dimensional, string-inspired cosmological model with gravitational anomalies (of Chern-Simons (CS) type) at early epochs, and a totally-antisymmetric torsion, dual to a massless axion-like field ("gravitational axion"), which couples to the CS term. Under appropriate conditions, primordial gravitational waves can condense, leading to a condensate of the CS anomaly term. As a consequence, one obtains inflation in this theory, of running-vacuum-model (RVM) type, without the need for external inflatons. At the end of the inflationary era, chiral fermionic matter is generated, who…
Similarily as in the Ashtekar approach, the translational Chern-Simons term is, as a generating function, instrumental for a chiral reformulation of simple (N=1) supergravity. After applying the algebraic Cartan relation between spin and torsion, the resulting canonical transformation induces not only decomposition of the gravitational fields into selfdual and antiselfdual modes, but also a splitting of the Rarita-Schwinger fields into their chiral parts in a natural way. In some detail, we also analyze the consequences for axial and chiral anomalies.
I review several aspects of torsion in string-inspired cosmologies. In particular, I discuss its connection with fundamental, string-model independent, axion fields associated with the massless gravitational multiplet of the string. I argue in favour of the role of primordial gravitational anomalies coupled to such axions in inducing inflation of a type encountered in the "running-vacuum-model (RVM)" cosmological framework, without fundamental inflaton fields. The gravitational-anomaly terms owe their existence to the Green-Schwarz mechanism for the (extra-dimensional) anomaly cancellation, an…
We discuss here a specific field-theory model, inspired from string theory, in which the generation of a matter-antimatter asymmetry in the Cosmos is due to the propagation of fermions in a non-trivial, spherically asymmetric (and hence Lorentz violating) gravitational background that may characterise the epochs of the early universe. The background induces different dispersion relations, hence populations, between fermions and antifermions, and thus CPT Violation (CPTV) already in thermal equilibrium. Species populations may freeze out leading to leptogenesis and baryogenesis. More specifical…
Earlier Bamba et al [JCAP (2012)] have obtained cosmological magnetic fields in teleparallel torsion theories of gravity that are not compatible with galactic dynamos. This result agrees with previous ones obtained by the author which shows [Phys Lett B (2012)] that anti-dynamo generalised theorem to torsion theories forbides such kind of dynamos to explain galactic magnetic fields of the order of $μ$G. More recently the author has suggested [IJAA (2012)] that a sort of Biermann battery could be obtained in torsioned cosmology. Nevertheless in this paper we show that this can be a particular r…
Square-torsion gravity is applied to the long standing dark matter problem. In this context the theory reduces to General Relativity complemented by a dark stress-energy tensor due to the torsion of spacetime and is studied under the simplifying assumption of spherical symmetry. The dark stress-energy tensor is found to satisfy an anisotropic structure equation. In vacuum this is shown to be equivalent to a wave equation with sources. A natural class of exact solutions is found which explicitly perturbs any seed spacetime metric by a conformal factor satisfying a (1+1)-dimensional wave equatio…
