2017/10/31 by Katsuki Aoki, Kei-ichi Maeda, Yosuke Misonoh +2
Physics and Astronomy · #Angular momentum #Black Holes and Theoretical Physics #Classical mechanics #Cosmology and Gravitation Theories #Gravitation #Graviton #Mathematical physics #Minkowski space #Physics #Pulsars and Gravitational Waves Research #Quantum mechanics #Spacetime #astro-ph.CO #gr-qc #hep-th
paper · pdf · doi:10.1103/physrevd.97.044005
published as Phys. Rev. D 97, 044005 (2018) · 16 pages, 7 tables, 3 figures; v2: references added, improved discussion, published version
openalex publication_date 2018/02/05 · arxiv created 2018/02/08 · arxiv updated 2018/02/14 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/06
We find vacuum solutions such that massive gravitons are confined in a local spacetime region by their gravitational energy in asymptotically flat spacetimes in the context of the bigravity theory. We call such self-gravitating objects massive graviton geons. The basic equations can be reduced to the Schr"odinger-Poisson equations with the tensor ``wave function'' in the Newtonian limit. We obtain a nonspherically symmetric solution with j=2, \ensuremathℓ=0 as well as a spherically symmetric solution with j=0, \ensuremathℓ=2 in this system where j is the total angular momentum quantum number and \ensuremathℓ is the orbital angular momentum quantum number, respectively. The energy eigenvalue of the Schr"odinger equation in the nonspherical solution is smaller than that in the spherical solution. We then study the perturbative stability of the spherical solution and find that there is an unstable mode in the quadrupole mode perturbations which may be interpreted as the transition mode to the nonspherical solution. The results suggest that the nonspherically symmetric solution is the ground state of the massive graviton geon. The massive graviton geons may decay in time due to emissions of gravitational waves but this timescale can be quite long when the massive gravitons are nonrelativistic and then the geons can be long-lived. We also argue possible prospects of the massive graviton geons: applications to the ultralight dark matter scenario, nonlinear (in)stability of the Minkowski spacetime, and a quantum transition of the spacetime.