Gravity a la Born-Infeld

TL;DR

This paper introduces a class of Born-Infeld style gravity theories that regularize singularities and potentially cancel ghosts, with implications for string theory and gravitational regularization.

Contribution

It presents a novel technique for constructing gravity theories in Born-Infeld style, addressing singularities and ghost issues, and discusses their relation to string theory.

Findings

Regularize Schwarzschild singularity

Allow for ghost cancellation in models

Illustrate a string theory regularization mechanism

Abstract

A simple technique for the construction of gravity theories in Born-Infeld style is presented, and the properties of some of these novel theories are investigated. They regularize the positive energy Schwarzschild singularity, and a large class of models allows for the cancellation of ghosts. The possible correspondence to low energy string theory is discussed. By including curvature corrections to all orders in alpha', the new theories nicely illustrate a mechanism that string theory might use to regularize gravitational singularities.