2002/01/31 by Lior M. Burko, Abraham I. Harte, Eric Poisson · 3 citations
Physics and Astronomy · #Astrophysics #Black Holes and Theoretical Physics #Classical mechanics #Cosmology #Cosmology and Gravitation Theories #De Sitter universe #Galaxies: Formation, Evolution, Phenomena #Physics #Point particle #Quantum electrodynamics #Quantum mechanics #Scalar (mathematics) #Scalar boson #Scalar field #Spacetime #Universe #astro-ph #gr-qc #hep-th
paper · pdf · doi:10.1103/physrevd.65.124006
published as Phys.Rev. D65 (2002) 124006 · 11 pages, RevTeX4, Accepted for Phys. Rev. D
arxiv created 2002/04/12 · openalex publication_date 2002/05/23 · arxiv updated 2009/11/30 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/05
We study the phenomenon of mass loss by a scalar charge---a point particle that acts as a source for a noninteracting scalar field---in an expanding universe. The charge is placed on comoving world lines of two cosmological spacetimes: a de Sitter universe, and a spatially flat, matter-dominated universe. In both cases, we find that the particle's rest mass is not a constant, but that it changes in response to the emission of monopole scalar radiation by the particle. In de Sitter spacetime, the particle radiates all of its mass within a finite proper time. In the matter-dominated cosmology, this happens only if the charge of the particle is sufficiently large; for smaller charges the particle first loses some of its mass, but then regains it all eventually.