Graviton propagation in ghost-free massive gravity
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arXiv
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| Main Authors: | , , , |
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| Format: | Preprint |
| Published: |
2026
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| _version_ | 1866915954979504128 |
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| author | de Rham, Claudia Kożuszek, Jan Tolley, Andrew J. Wiseman, Toby |
| author_facet | de Rham, Claudia Kożuszek, Jan Tolley, Andrew J. Wiseman, Toby |
| contents | We consider the ghost-free dRGT massive gravity with two of its three possible mass terms. This theory has five gravitational degrees of freedom. On Minkowski spacetime these modes have helicity-2, -1 and -0 and propagate on the Minkowski lightcone in the high-frequency limit. However for a general background the degrees of freedom corresponding to the helicity-1 and -0 modes have characteristics different to that of the metric lightcone. Here we prove in all generality, that the two degrees of freedom corresponding to the helicity-2 mode always propagate on the metric lightcone for any background in the high-frequency limit, which has significant relevance for current and future observational tests of the theory. |
| format | Preprint |
| id |
arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2604_22418 |
| institution | arXiv |
| publishDate | 2026 |
| record_format | arxiv |
| spellingShingle | Graviton propagation in ghost-free massive gravity de Rham, Claudia Kożuszek, Jan Tolley, Andrew J. Wiseman, Toby High Energy Physics - Theory General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology We consider the ghost-free dRGT massive gravity with two of its three possible mass terms. This theory has five gravitational degrees of freedom. On Minkowski spacetime these modes have helicity-2, -1 and -0 and propagate on the Minkowski lightcone in the high-frequency limit. However for a general background the degrees of freedom corresponding to the helicity-1 and -0 modes have characteristics different to that of the metric lightcone. Here we prove in all generality, that the two degrees of freedom corresponding to the helicity-2 mode always propagate on the metric lightcone for any background in the high-frequency limit, which has significant relevance for current and future observational tests of the theory. |
| title | Graviton propagation in ghost-free massive gravity |
| topic | High Energy Physics - Theory General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology |
| url | https://arxiv.org/abs/2604.22418 |