Gian Luigi Alberghi

Charged false vacuum bubbles and the AdS/CFT correspondence

We initiate a study of cosmology within the framework of Maldacenas AdS/CFT correspondence. We present a comprehensive analysis of the classical motion of a charged domain wall that separates an external Reissner-Nordstrom region of spacetime (with small or vanishing cosmological constant) from an internal de-Sitter region. The possible associated spacetime diagrams are drawn, although in the classical case, an unambiguous prediction of what occurs at late times in the interior region is not possible, since singularities and Cauchy horizons form. We argue that, when the asymptotic region is anti-de Sitter, the AdS/CFT correspondence gives a prescription for resolving the curvature singularities and evolving solutions across the expected Cauchy horizon. Some of our solutions contain inflating interiors, and we provide evidence these can be patched onto solutions with smooth initial data, circumventing an obstacle found by Farhi and Guth to creating an inflating universe in the laboratory.

Brane-world black holes and the scale of gravity

A particle in four dimensions should behave like a classical black hole if the horizon radius is larger than the Compton wavelength or, equivalently, if its degeneracy (measured by entropy in units of the Planck scale) is large. For spherically symmetric black holes in 4 + d dimensions, both arguments again lead to a mass threshold MC and degeneracy scale Mdeg of the order of the fundamental scale of gravity MG. In the brane-world, deviations from the Schwarzschild metric induced by bulk effects alter the horizon radius and effective four-dimensional Euclidean action in such a way that MC ≃ Mdeg might be either larger or smaller than MG. This opens up the possibility that black holes exist with a mass smaller than MG and might be produced at the LHC even if MG ≳ 10 TeV, whereas effects due to bulk graviton exchanges remain undetectable because suppressed by inverse powers of MG. Conversely, even if black holes are not found at the LHC, it is still possible that MC ≫ MG and MG ≃ 1 TeV.

Quantum gravity effects in black holes at the LHC

We study possible back-reaction and quantum gravity effects in the evaporation of black holes which could be produced at the LHC through a modification of the Hawking emission. The corrections are phenomenologically taken into account by employing a modified relation between the black hole mass and temperature. The usual assumption that black holes explode around 1 TeV is also released, and the evaporation process is extended to (possibly much) smaller final masses. We show that these effects could be observable for black holes produced with a relatively large mass and should therefore be taken into account when simulating micro-black hole events for the experiments planned at the LHC.

Build-up of interference patterns with single electrons

A conventional transmission electron microscope, equipped with a fast recording system able to measure the electron arrival time and the position of single electrons, is used to show the build-up of interference patterns. Two experiments are presented. The first is the electron version of the Grimaldi and Young experiments performed with light, where single electrons strike on an opaque thin wire. Interference fringes are observed in the geometrical shadow of the wire and diffraction effects are clearly displayed at the wire edges. The second, original experiment reports the build-up of two-slit interference patterns with single electrons.

Gauss-Bonnet brane cosmology with radion stabilization

We study cosmology in a five-dimensional brane-world with a stabilizing effective potential for the radion and matter localized on the two branes. We consider the corrections induced by the Gauss-Bonnet contribution to the total action performing and expansion around the two possible static solutions up to second order in the ratio between brane matter energy density and brane tensions. The Friedmann and acceleration equations on the visible brane are obtained and discussed.

Cosmological unparticle correlators

Abstract We introduce and study an extension of the correlator of unparticle matter operators in a cosmological environment. Starting from FRW spaces we specialize to a de Sitter space–time and derive its inflationary power spectrum which we find to be almost flat. We finally investigate some consequences of requiring the existence of a unitary boundary conformal field theory in the framework of the dS/CFT correspondence.

Stacking non-BPS D-Branes

Abstract We present a candidate supergravity solution for a stacked configuration of stable non-BPS D-branes in Type II string theory compactified on T 4 / Z 2 . This gives a supergravity description of nonabelian tachyon condensation on the brane worldvolume.

Inflation and the semiclassical dynamics of a conformal scalar field

We derive the semiclassical evolution of massless conformally coupled scalar matter in the de Sitter space-time from the Born-Oppenheimer reduction of the Wheeler-DeWitt equation. We find a remarkable difference with respect to the minimally coupled case: the effect of the quantum gravitational corrections does not depend on the momentum of the scalar mode up to second order in the Planck length and, therefore, there are no relevant corrections to the dispersion relation.

Particle production in tachyon condensation

We study particle production in the tachyon condensation process as described by different effective actions for the tachyon. By making use of invariant operators, we are able to obtain exact results for the density of produced particles, which is shown to depend strongly on the specific action. In particular, the rate of particle production remains finite only for one of the actions considered, hence confirming results previously appeared in the literature.

Classical dynamics and stability of collapsing thick shells of matter

We study the collapse towards the gravitational radius of a macroscopic spherical thick shell surrounding an inner massive core. This overall electrically neutral macroshell is composed of many nested δ-like massive microshells which can bear non-zero electric charge, and a possibly non-zero cosmological constant is also included. The dynamics of the shells is described by means of Israels (Lanczos) junction conditions for singular hypersurfaces and, adopting a Hartree (mean-field) approach, an effective Hamiltonian for the motion of each microshell is derived which allows us to check the stability of the matter composing the macroshell. We end by briefly commenting on the quantum effects which may arise from the extension of our classical treatment to the semiclassical level.