1998/07/23 by Valerio Faraoni, Faraoni, Valerio
Physics and Astronomy · #Astrophysics (astro-ph) #FOS: Physical sciences #General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology (gr-qc) #astro-ph #gr-qc
paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.gr-qc/9807066
7 pages, LaTeX, no figures, to appear in Proceedings of the 7th Canadian Conference on General Relativity and Relativistic Astrophysics (Calgary, Canada 1997)
arxiv created 1998/07/23 · arxiv updated 2009/11/30
The non-minimal coupling of a scalar field to the Ricci curvature in a curved spacetime is unavoidable according to several authors. The coupling constant is not a free parameter: the prescriptions for the value of the coupling constant in specific scalar field and gravity theories (in particular in general relativity) are studied. The results are applied to the most popular inflationary scenarios of cosmology and their theoretical consistence is analysed. Certain observational constraints on the coupling constant are also discussed.