Black hole and cosmological analysis of BF sequestered gravity

TL;DR

This paper extends a topological field theory-based modification of general relativity to include gauge field dynamics, analyzing black hole and cosmological solutions that reveal deviations from standard predictions and potential implications for the cosmological constant problem.

Contribution

It introduces a kinetic term for the gauge field in a BF sequestered gravity model and explores its effects on black hole and cosmological solutions.

Findings

Deviations near black hole horizons with charge-like behavior.

Cosmological solutions with always positive ot;H and asymptotic constant H.

Potential implications for the cosmological constant problem.

Abstract

We study a minimal extension of a recently proposed modification of general relativity that draws on concepts from topological field theory to resolve aspects of the cosmological constant problem. In the original model, the field content of general relativity was augmented to include a gauge field and an adjoint-valued two-form without modifying the classical gravitational dynamics. Here we include a kinetic term for the gauge field which sources fluctuations of the cosmological constant. We then study spherically symmetric black holes and a simple homogeneous, isotropic cosmological model predicted by the extended theory. For the black hole case, we observe deviations near the event horizon as well as a ``charge"-like behavior induced by the gauge field. In the cosmological case, $\dot{H}$ is always positive and some solutions asymptote to a constant $H$.