Curved dilatonic brane worlds

TL;DR

This paper presents exact solutions for five-dimensional brane worlds with a scalar field, demonstrating a self-tuning mechanism that makes the four-dimensional geometry insensitive to brane vacuum energy, with implications for cosmology.

Contribution

It introduces a new class of curved brane world solutions with a scalar field that self-tune the vacuum energy effects, advancing understanding of brane cosmology.

Findings

Self-tuning mechanism cancels vacuum energy effects.

Exact solutions for curved brane worlds with scalar fields.

Analysis of dynamics in physically relevant models.

Abstract

We construct a broad family of exact solutions to the five-dimensional Einstein equations coupled to a scalar field with an exponential potential. Embedding a three-brane in these bulk space-times in a particular way we obtain a class of self-tuned curved brane worlds in which the vacuum energy on the brane is gravitationally idle, the four-dimensional geometry being insensitive to the value of the brane tension. This self-tuning arises from cancellations, enforced by the junction conditions, between the scalar field potential, the brane vacuum energy and the matter on the brane. Finally, we study some physically relevant examples and their dynamics.