Classical and Quantum Dynamics of Gyroscopic Systems and Dark Energy

Abstract

Gyroscopic systems in classical and quantum field theory are characterized by the presence of at least two scalar degrees of freedom and by terms that mix fields and their time derivatives in the quadratic Lagrangian. In Minkowski spacetime, they naturally appear in the presence of a coupling among fields with time-dependent vacuum expectation values and fields with space-dependent vacuum expectation values, breaking spontaneously Lorentz symmetry; this is the case for a supersolid. In a cosmological background a gyroscopic system can also arise from the time dependence of non-diagonal kinetic and mass matrices. We study the classical and quantum dynamics computing the correlation functions on the vacuum state that minimizes the energy. Two regions of stability in parameter space are found: in one region, dubbed normal, the Hamiltonian is positive defined, while in the second region, dubbed anomalous, it has no definite sign. Interestingly, in the anomalous region the 2-point correlation function exhibits a resonant behaviour in a certain region of parameter space. We show that dynamical dark energy models (with exact equation of state $w=-1$) can be realised as a gyroscopic system.