General Relativity with Local Space-time Defects

TL;DR

This paper proposes a modified theory of general relativity incorporating local space-time defects, deriving their density evolution, which diminishes faster than radiation, to address quantum effects in gravity.

Contribution

It introduces a novel modification of general relativity that models local space-time defects and analyzes their cosmological implications.

Findings

Defects' density decreases faster than radiation over time.

The modified theory provides a new perspective on quantum effects in gravity.

Solutions to the Friedmann equations reveal the behavior of defects in cosmology.

Abstract

General relativity is incomplete because it cannot describe quantum effects of space-time. The complete theory of quantum gravity is not yet known and to date no observational evidence exists that space-time is quantized. However, in most approaches to quantum gravity the space-time manifold of general relativity is only an effective limit that, among other things like higher curvature terms, should receive corrections stemming from space-time defects. We here develop a modification of general relativity that describes local space-time defects and solve the Friedmann equations. From this, we obtain the time-dependence of the density of defects. It turns out that the defects' density dilutes quickly, somewhat faster even than radiation.