Sudden Singularities in Brans-Dicke Cosmology and its Generalisations

Abstract

We show that cosmological sudden singularities that respect the energy conditions can occur at finite times in Brans-Dicke and more general scalar-tensor theories of gravity. We construct these explicitly in the Friedmann universes. Higher-order versions of these singularities are also possible, including those that arise with when scalar fields have a self-interaction potential of power-law form.7 pages, no figures