Square-Root Gauge Theory and Modified Gravity -- Gravity-Assisted Confinement/Deconfinement and Emergent Electro-Weak Symmetry Breaking in Cosmology

TL;DR

This paper explores a modified gravity and nonlinear gauge field theory that explains the transition from a charge-confining early universe to a late universe with confinement, electroweak symmetry breaking, and a cosmological constant.

Contribution

It introduces a novel model combining square-root gauge fields with $f(R)$ gravity to unify early universe suppression of confinement and Higgs breaking with late universe dynamical phenomena.

Findings

Suppression of charge confinement in early universe

Dynamical emergence of confinement and Higgs effect in late universe

Generation of non-zero cosmological constant dynamically

Abstract

In the present contribution to the proceedings of MG17, the main aim is to elucidate the physically important effects of a special nonlinear gauge field with a square-root of the standard Maxwell Lagrangian in its action, interacting with a specific non-canonical modified $f(R)= R + R^2$ gravity formulated in terms of metric-independent spacetime volume elements and in addition coupled to the bosonic fields of the standard electroweak particle model. When applied in the context of cosmological evolution, the above theory consistently describes absence (suppression) of charge confinement and electroweak (Higgs) spontaneous breakdown in the ``early'' Universe, whereas in the post-inflationary ``late'' universe primarily the presence of the ``square-root'' nonlinear gauge field dynamically triggers both the appearance of QCD-like confinement and dynamical generation of the Higgs effect, as well as dynamical generation of non-zero cosmological constant.