Scalaron tunneling and the fate of antisymmetric tensor fields in $F(R)$ gravity

Abstract

The work provides a possible explanation of a well motivated question - why the present universe is practically free from any noticeable footmarks of higher rank antisymmetric tensor fields, despite having the signatures of scalar, vector, fermion as well as symmetric rank 2 tensor field in the form of gravity ? The explanation proposed here originates from the higher curvature degrees of freedom present in a $F(R)$ gravity model. In such a model, we show that the scalar degree of freedom (also known as scalaron) associated with the higher curvature term may undergo a quantum tunneling which in turn suppresses the couplings of antisymmetric massless tensor fields with various Standard Model fields.