SEMICLASSICAL VIOLATION of THE EQUIVALENCE PRINCIPLE IN THE GRAVITATIONAL LENSES REALM

Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq)

Gravitational constraints of dS branes in an AdS Einstein-Brans-Dicke bulk

Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq)

Gravitational Capture of Asteroids by Gas Drag

Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (FAPESP)

Gravitational effects of Nix and Hydra in the external region of the Pluto-Charon system

Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (FAPESP)

Feature selection through gravitational search algorithm

In this paper we deal with the problem of feature selection by introducing a new approach based on Gravitational Search Algorithm (GSA). The proposed algorithm combines the optimization behavior of GSA together with the speed of Optimum-Path Forest (OPF) classifier in order to provide a fast and accurate framework for feature selection. Experiments on datasets obtained from a wide range of applications, such as vowel recognition, image classification and fraud detection in power distribution systems are conducted in order to asses the robustness of the proposed technique against Principal Component Analysis (PCA), Linear Discriminant Analysis (LDA) and a Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO)-based algorithm for feature selection.

Photon mass and gravitational deflection

The deflection of a massive photon by an external gravitational field is energy-dependent. Interesting enough, any massive quantum particle, no matter what its spin is, undergoes dispersive deflection in external gravitational fields. Exploiting the dispersive deflection of the quantized massive electromagnetic radiation by the gravitational field of the Sun, we find an upper bound for the photon mass.

Propagator, tree-level unitarity and effective nonrelativistic potential for three-dimensional higher-derivative gravity augmented by a gravitational Chern-Simons term

An algorithm for computing the propagator for three-dimensional quadratic gravity with a gravitational Chern-Simons term, based on an extension of the three-dimensional Barnes-Rivers operators, is proposed. A systematic study of the tree-level unitarity of this theory is developed and its agreement with Newton's law is investigated by computing the effective nonrelativistic potential. (C) 2000 Elsevier B.V. B.V. All rights reserved.

Gravitational rainbow of massive particles

Photon propagation is non-dispersive within the context of semiclassical general relativity. What about the remaining massless particles? It can be shown that at the tree level the scattering of massless particles of spin 0, 1/2, 1 or whatever by a static gravitational field generated by a localized source such as the Sun, treated as an external field, is non-dispersive as well. It is amazing, however, that massive particles, regardless of whether they have integral or half-integral spin, experience an energy-dependent gravitational deflection. Therefore, semiclassical general relativity and gravitational rainbows of massive particles can coexist without conflict. We address this issue in this essay.

Gravitational rainbow

It is shown that, unlike Einstein's gravity, quadratic gravity produces dispersive photon propagation. The energy-dependent contribution to the deflection of photons passing by the Sun is computed and subsequently the angle at which the visible spectrum would be spread over is plotted as a function of the R-mu nu(2)-sector mass.

Is it physically sound to add a topologically massive term to three-dimensional massive electromagnetic or gravitational models?

The addition of a topologically massive term to an admittedly nonunitary three-dimensional massive model, be it an electromagnetic system or a gravitational one, does not cure its nonunitarity. What about the enlargement of avowedly unitary massive models by way of a topologically massive term? the electromagnetic models remain unitary after the topological augmentation but, surprisingly enough, the gravitational ones have their unitarity spoiled. Here we analyze these issues and present the explanation why unitary massive gravitational models, unlike unitary massive electromagnetic ones, cannot coexist from the viewpoint of unitarity with topologically massive terms. We also discuss the novel features of the three-term effective field models that are gauge-invariant.

Scattering of photons by an external gravitational field in the framework of higher-derivative gravity

The scattering of photons by a static gravitational field, treated as an external field, is discussed in the context of gravity with higher derivatives. It is shown that the R-2 sector of the theory does not contribute to the photon scattering, whereas the R-mu nu(2) sector produces dispersive (energy-dependent) photon propagation.

Some remarks on the neutrino oscillation phase in a gravitational field

The weak gravitational field expansion method to account for the gravitationally induced neutrino oscillation effect is critically examined, then it is shown that the splitting of the neutrino phase into a kinematic and a gravitational phase is not always possible because the relativistic factor modifies the particle interference phase splitting condition in a gravitational field.

Gravitational deflection of massive particles in classical and semiclassical general relativity

We calculate the gravitational deflection of massive particles moving with relativistic velocity in the solar system to second post-Newtonian order. For a particle passing close to the Sun with impact parameter b, the deflection in classical general relativity is Phi(C)[GRAPHICS]where v(0) is the particle speed at infinity and M is the Sun's mass. We compute afterwards the gravitational deflection of a spinless neutral particle of mass m in the same static gravitational field as above, treated now as an external field. For a scalar boson with energy E, the deflection in semiclassical general relativity (SGR) is Phisc[GRAPHICS]This result shows that the propagation of the =2E spinless massive boson produces inexorably dispersive effects. It also shows that the semiclassical prediction is always greater than the geometrical one, no matter what the boson mass is. In addition, it is found that SGR predicts a deflection angle of similar to2.6 arcsec for a nonrelativistic spinless massive boson passing at the Sun's limb.

Torsion and the gravitational interaction

By using a nonholonomous-frame formulation of the general covariance principle, seen as an active version of the strong equivalence principle, an analysis of the gravitational coupling prescription in the presence of curvature and torsion is made. The Coupling prescription implied by this principle is found to be always equivalent to that of general relativity, a result that reinforces the completeness of this theory, as well as the teleparallel point of view according to which torsion does not represent additional degrees of freedom for gravity, but simply an alternative way of representing the gravitational field.

The nonlinear essence of gravitational waves

A critical review of gravitational wave theory is made. It is pointed out that the usual linear approach to the gravitational wave theory is neither conceptually consistent nor mathematically justified. Relying upon that analysis it is argued that-analogously to a Yang-Mills propagating field, which must be nonlinear to carry its gauge charge-a gravitational wave must necessarily be nonlinear to transport its own charge-that is, energy-momentum.