Radius Destabilization in Five Dimensional Orbifolds Due to an Enhanced Casimir Effect

TL;DR

This paper studies how Lorentz-violating vector fields influence the Casimir effect in five-dimensional orbifolds, revealing an enhanced attractive force that challenges moduli stabilization in higher-dimensional theories.

Contribution

It calculates the one-loop Casimir energy in a 5D Randall-Sundrum model with Lorentz violation, showing an increased attractive force affecting stability.

Findings

Lorentz-violating fields enhance the Casimir attraction.

Stability requires additional positive contributions to counteract this effect.

The results impact moduli stabilization in higher-dimensional cosmological models.

Abstract

One of the challenges in connecting higher dimensional theories to cosmology is stabilization of the moduli fields. We investigate the role of a Lorentz violating vector field in the context of stabilization. Specifically, we compute the one loop Casimir energy in Randall-Sundrum 5-dimensional (non-supersymmetric) S^1/ Z_2 orbifolds resulting from the interaction of a real scalar field with periodic boundary conditions with a Lorentz violating vector field. We find that the result is an enhanced attractive Casimir force. Hence, for stability, positive contributions to the Casimir force from branes and additional fields would be required to counter the destabilizing, attractive effect of Lorentz violating fields.