Scalar Gravitational Waves Can Be Generated Even Without Direct Coupling Between Dark Energy and Ordinary Matter

Abstract

We point out, the scalar sector of gravitational perturbations may be excited by an isolated astrophysical system immersed in a universe whose accelerated expansion is not due to the cosmological constant, but due to extra field degrees of freedom. This is true even if the source of gravitational radiation did not couple directly to these additional fields. We illustrate this by considering a universe driven by a single canonical scalar field. By working within the gauge-invariant formalism, we solve for the electric components of the linearised Weyl tensor to demonstrate that both the gravitational massless spin-2 (transverse-traceless) tensor and the (Bardeen) scalar modes are generated by a generic astrophysical source. For concreteness, the Dark Energy scalar field is either released from rest, or allowed to asymptote to the minimum in a certain class of potentials; and we compute the traceless tidal forces induced by gravitational radiation from a hypothetical compact binary system residing in such a universe. Though their magnitudes are very small compared to the tensors', spin zero gravitational waves in such a canonical scalar driven universe are directly sensitive to both the Dark Energy equation of state and the eccentricity of the binary's orbit.