Generalized Lovelock gravity

Abstract

In the Riemann geometry, the metric's equation of motion for an arbitrary Lagrangian is succinctly expressed in term of the first variation of the action with respect to the Riemann tensor if the Riemann tensor were independent of the metric. Let this variation be called the E-tensor. Noting that the E-tensor and equations of the motion for a general Lovelock gravity have the same differential degree, we define generalized Lovelock gravity as polynomial scalar densities constructed out from the Riemann tensor and its arbitrary covariant derivatives such that they lead to the same differential degree for the E-tensor and the metric's equation of motion. We consider Lagrangian densities which are functional of the metric and the first covariant derivative of the Riemann tensor. We then present the first non-trivial examples of the generalized Lovelock gravity terms.