Long Range Effects in Gravity Theories with Vainshtein Screening

TL;DR

This paper explores long-range modifications of gravity within bigravity theories, deriving light deflection equations, analyzing lensing effects, and setting bounds on new spin-2 fields through galaxy cluster and rotation curve observations.

Contribution

It introduces the first derivation of light deflection equations in bigravity and assesses their impact on lensing, galaxy rotation curves, and dark matter estimates.

Findings

Derived light deflection equations in bigravity.

Set bounds on spin-2 field parameters from lensing data.

Analyzed effects on galactic rotation curves and dark matter abundance.

Abstract

In this paper we study long range modifications of gravity in the consistent framework of bigravity, which introduces a second massive spin-2 field and allows to continuously interpolate between the regime of General Relativity (mediated by a massless spin-2 field) and massive gravity (mediated by a massive spin-2 field). In particular we derive for the first time the equations for light deflection in this framework and study the effect on the lensing potential of galaxy clusters. By comparison of kinematic and lensing mass reconstructions, stringent bounds can be set on the parameter space of the new spin-2 fields. Furthermore, we investigate galactic rotation curves and the effect on the observable dark matter abundance within this framework.