GRG Editor's Choice: Higher curvature gravities, unlike GR, cannot be bootstrapped from their (usual) linearizations

Journal cover: General Relativity and Gravitation Deser, S., Higher curvature gravities, unlike GR, cannot be bootstrapped from their (usual) linearizations, Gen Relativ Gravit (2017) 49: 149. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10714-017-2308-6

Editor's Choice (Research Article)

First Online: 07 November 2017

"This paper extends the author's original contribution from 1970 to a broad class of theories that modify general relativity. The result is a paper that provides a continuation of the 1970 story. The author's style and commitment to exposing the structural elements of the procedure make for a very nice article that reads well and serves a useful and illuminating purpose in the 'extensions of GR' literature."

Abstract:

We show that higher curvature order gravities, in particular the propagating quadratic curvature models, cannot be derived by self-coupling from their linear, flat space, forms, except through an unphysical version of linearization; only GR can. Separately, we comment on an early version of the self-coupling bootstrap.

The author:

deser © Springer Prof. Stanley Deser is Emeritus Professor of Physics at Brandeis University and a Senior Research Associate at California Institute of Technology, USA. His research interests include quantum theory of fields, elementary particles, gravitation, supergravity, and strings.

GRG Editor's Choice:

In each volume of GRG, a few papers are marked as “Editor’s Choice”. The primary criteria is original, high quality research that is of wide interest within the community.