1/r potential in higher dimensions

Abstract

In Einstein gravity, gravitational potential goes as 1 / rd-3 in d non-compactified spacetime dimensions, which assumes the familiar 1 / r form in four dimensions. On the other hand, it goes as 1 / rα, with α= (d- 2 m- 1) / m, in pure Lovelock gravity involving only one mth order term of the Lovelock polynomial in the gravitational action. The latter offers a novel possibility of having 1 / r potential for the non-compactified dimension spectrum given by d= 3 m+ 1. Thus it turns out that in the two prototype gravitational settings of isolated objects, like black holes and the universe as a whole – cosmological models, the Einstein gravity in four and mth order pure Lovelock gravity in 3 m+ 1 dimensions behave in a similar fashion as far as gravitational interactions are considered. However propagation of gravitational waves (or the number of degrees of freedom) does indeed serve as a discriminator because it has two polarizations only in four dimensions.