[The University of Texas at Austin: What starts here changes the world]
Theory Group
Theory Group Seminar, 12 April 2011


Dr. Justin Khoury, University of Pennsylvania

Screening Dark Energy

abstract

This talk will explore the possibility that the dark sector includes new light degrees of freedom (generally scalar fields) that mediate long-range forces on cosmological scales. To ensure consistency with laboratory and solar system tests of gravity, some screening mechanism is necessary to "hide" these degrees of freedom locally. I will focus on two broad classes of screening theories, chameleons and symmetrons, which rely respectively on the scalar field acquiring a large mass or weak coupling in the presence of large ambient matter density. Finally, I will discuss some of the phenomenological/cosmological implications of these theories.



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