Influence functionals, decoherence and conformally coupled scalars

Abstract

Some of the simplest modifications to general relativity involve the coupling of additional scalar fields to the scalar curvature. By making a Weyl rescaling of the metric, these theories can be mapped to Einstein gravity with the additional scalar fields instead being coupled universally to matter. The resulting couplings to matter give rise to scalar fifth forces, which can evade the stringent constraints from local tests of gravity by means of so-called screening mechanisms. In this talk, we derive evolution equations for the matrix elements of the reduced density operator of a toy matter sector by means of the Feynman-Vernon influence functional. In particular, we employ a novel approach akin to the LSZ reduction more familiar to scattering-matrix theory. The resulting equations allow the analysis, for instance, of decoherence induced in atom-interferometry experiments by these classes of modified theories of gravity.

Citation

Burrage, C., Käding, C., Millington, P., & Minář, J. (2019). Influence functionals, decoherence and conformally coupled scalars. Journal of Physics: Conference Series, 1275(1), Article 012041. https://doi.org/10.1088/1742-6596/1275/1/012041

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: Aug 29, 2019
• Online Publication Date: Sep 17, 2019
• Publication Date: 2019-09
• Deposit Date: Sep 19, 2019
• Publicly Available Date: Sep 20, 2019
• Journal: Journal of Physics: Conference Series
• Print ISSN: 1742-6588
• Electronic ISSN: 1742-6596
• Publisher: IOP Publishing
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 1275
• Issue: 1
• Article Number: 012041
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1088/1742-6596/1275/1/012041
• Keywords: General Physics and Astronomy
• Public URL: https://nottingham-repository.worktribe.com/output/2635734
• Publisher URL: https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1742-6596/1275/1/012041