Interaction of cosmological domain walls with large classical objects, like planets and satellites, and the flyby anomaly

TL;DR

This paper investigates how cosmological domain walls interact with large classical objects like planets and satellites, proposing new methods to detect such walls through observable effects like mass change or energy loss, and explaining the flyby anomaly.

Contribution

It introduces a model for the interaction between domain walls and macroscopic objects, and suggests observational signatures for detecting domain walls via satellite measurements and anomalies.

Findings

Satellites can experience measurable mass changes during wall interactions.

Flyby anomalies can be explained by domain wall interactions.

Matter can induce local vacuum decay near domain walls.

Abstract

Cosmological domain walls can be formed as a result of symmetry breaking at any epoch during the evolution of our universe. We study their interaction with a classical macroscopic object, like Earth or a satellite in Earth's orbit. We set up an action that includes the interaction term between the massive classical object and the scalar field that the domain wall is made of. We use numerical calculations to solve the coupled equations of motion which describe the crossing between the domain wall and the classical object. Depending on the strength of the interaction, relative velocity and size, the object can be either stopped by the wall, or it can pass through it inducing deformations in the wall that cost energy. At the same time, the coupling to the scalar filed might change the object's mass during the crossover. The fact that satellites in Earth's orbit (or planets in Sun's orbit) can change their mass and/or lose energy interacting with walls can be used as a new domain wall detection probe. For example, a typical velocity precision of a satellite is about $0.5$ mm/s, which directly puts an upper limit on its mass change to $\Delta M/M \lessapprox 5\times 10^{-17} $. Alternatively, a known satellite flyby anomaly can easily be explained as an interaction with a closed domain wall. We also show that the presence of matter modifies the scalar filed potential and can locally create a bubble of the true vacuum, and thus trigger the decay of the false vacuum. For a critical bubble which is able to expand, such an interaction with the domain wall must be strong enough.