Induced Gravity and the Attractor Dynamics of Dark Energy/Dark Matter

TL;DR

This paper investigates models where scalar fields coupled to matter and gravity produce attractor solutions that mimic a cosmological constant, aiming to explain cosmic acceleration while satisfying observational constraints.

Contribution

It analyzes combined scalar field couplings to matter and gravity, demonstrating their potential to produce stable, realistic dark energy models that approach general relativity.

Findings

Quartic potentials exhibit stable, asymptotically general relativity behavior

Combined couplings improve dynamical properties over individual couplings

Models can satisfy observational constraints on cosmic expansion

Abstract

Attractor solutions that give dynamical reasons for dark energy to act like the cosmological constant, or behavior close to it, are interesting possibilities to explain cosmic acceleration. Coupling the scalar field to matter or to gravity enlarges the dynamical behavior; we consider both couplings together, which can ameliorate some problems for each individually. Such theories have also been proposed in a Higgs-like fashion to induce gravity and unify dark energy and dark matter origins. We explore restrictions on such theories due to their dynamical behavior compared to observations of the cosmic expansion. Quartic potentials in particular have viable stability properties and asymptotically approach general relativity.