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Particle spectra of parity-violating theories: A less radical approach and an upgrade of the particle spectrum for any tensor Lagrangian framework

W. Barker1,2,3,*, G. K. Karananas4,†, and H. Tu2,3,‡

  • 1Central European Institute for Cosmology and Fundamental Physics, Institute of Physics of the Czech Academy of Sciences, Na Slovance 1999/2, 182 00 Prague 8, Czechia
  • 2Astrophysics Group, Cavendish Laboratory, JJ Thomson Avenue, Cambridge CB3 0HE, United Kingdom
  • 3Kavli Institute for Cosmology, Madingley Road, Cambridge CB3 0HA, United Kingdom
  • 4Arnold Sommerfeld Center for Theoretical Physics, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München, Theresienstraße 37, 80333 München, Germany

  • *Contact author: barker@fzu.cz
  • †Contact author: georgios.karananas@physik.uni-muenchen.de
  • ‡Contact author: ht486@cantab.ac.uk
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Phys. Rev. D 112, 084041 – Published 15 October, 2025

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/sghn-mc81

Abstract

Due to computational barriers, parity violation effects have been grossly neglected in gravitational model-building, creating a significant gap in the landscape of existing models. We present a new algorithm for efficiently computing the particle spectrum for any parity-violating tensorial field theory. It allows us to extract conditions for the absence of massive ghosts without resorting to any manipulation of radicals in cases where the particle masses are irrational functions of the Lagrangian coupling coefficients. We test it against several examples, among which is the most general parity-indefinite Einstein-Cartan/Poincaré gravity that propagates two healthy massive scalars (in addition to the massless graviton). Furthermore, we upgrade the psalter software in the wolfram language to accommodate parity-violating theories. psalter is a contribution to the xact project.

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Phys. Rev. D 112, 084041– Published 15 October, 2025
  • Received 14 June 2025
  • Accepted 12 August 2025
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