Nontrivial spacetime topology, CPT violation, and photons

Abstract

A physical mechanism for CPT violation is reviewed, which relies on chiral fermions, gauge interactions, and nontrivial spacetime topology. The nontrivial topology can occur at the very largest scale (e.g., at the "edge" of the universe) or at the very smallest scale (e.g., from a hypothetical spacetime foam). The anomalous effective gauge field action includes, most likely, a CPT-odd Chern-Simons-like term. Two phenomenological photon models with Abelian Chern-Simons-like terms are discussed.