'The End'

Abstract

Recently we proposed a mechanism for sequestering the Standard Model vacuum energy that predicts that the universe will collapse. Here we present a simple mechanism for bringing about this collapse, employing a scalar field whose potential is linear and becomes negative, providing the negative energy density required to end the expansion. The slope of the potential is chosen to allow for the expansion to last until the current Hubble time, about $10^{10}$ years, to accommodate our universe. Crucially, this choice is technically natural due to a shift symmetry. Moreover, vacuum energy sequestering selects {\it radiatively stable} initial conditions for the collapse, which guarantee that immediately before the turnaround the universe is dominated by the linear potential which drives an epoch of accelerated expansion for at least an efold. Thus a single, technically natural choice for the slope ensures that the collapse is imminent and is preceded by the current stage of cosmic acceleration, giving a new answer to the 'Why Now?' problem.

Very minor typo corrected

References in corpus (10)

• Higgs mass and vacuum stability in the Standard Model at NNLO
• Investigating the near-criticality of the Higgs boson
• A Small Cosmological Constant from a Large Extra Dimension
• Self-tuning flat domain walls in 5d gravity and string theory
• Sequestering the Standard Model Vacuum Energy
• Observational Bounds on Cosmic Doomsday
• Vacuum Energy Sequestering: The Framework and Its Cosmological Consequences
• The coincidence problem in linear dark energy models
• Anthropic versus cosmological solutions to the coincidence problem
• Vacuum energy sequestering and cosmic dynamics

Cited by in corpus (38)

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• The Well-Tempered Cosmological Constant
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• Vacuum Energy Sequestering and Graviton Loops
• Well-tempered teleparallel Horndeski cosmology: a teleparallel variation to the cosmological constant problem
• Self Tuning Scalar Fields in Spherically Symmetric Spacetimes
• Sequestering effects on and of vacuum decay
• Beyond Fab Four
• Gravitational Mechanisms to Self-Tune the Cosmological Constant: Obstructions and Ways Forward
• $2+1$ Einstein-Klein-Gordon black holes by gravitational decoupling
• An Etude on Global Vacuum Energy Sequester
• Well-Tempered Cosmology
• New Singularities in Unexpected Places
• Interacting cosmic fluids and phase transitions under a holographic modeling for dark energy
• The Well-Tempered Cosmological Constant: The Horndeski Variations
• A stringy perspective on the coincidence problem
• Monodromy inflation and an emergent mechanism for stabilising the cosmological constant
• The Well-Tempered Cosmological Constant: Fugue in B${}^{♭}$
• Manifestly Local Formulation of Nonlocal Approach to the Cosmological Constant Problem
• Irrational Monodromies of Vacuum Energy
• Cosmological consequences of Omnia Sequestra
• Quantum corrections to vacuum energy sequestering (with monodromy)
• The Super-Stuckelberg procedure and dS in Pure Supergravity
• Quantum Aspects of Nonlocal Approach to the Cosmological Constant Problem
• Generalised scalar-tensor theories and self-tuning
• Canonical formulation and path integral for local vacuum energy sequestering
• Weinberg's No Go Theorem in Quantum Gravity
• A natural theory of dark energy
• Self-tuning of the cosmological constant in brane-worlds with $P(X,\varphi )$
• More on Weinberg's No Go Theorem in Quantum Gravity
• Could the dynamics of the Universe be influenced by what is going on inside black holes?
• CMB constraints on monodromy inflation at strong coupling
• Gravitational relaxation of electroweak hierarchy problem
• An intricate quantum statistical effect and the foundation of quantum mechanics
• Cosmic Acceleration in the Nonlocal Approach to the Cosmological Constant Problem
• On the Constraint Structure of Vacuum Energy Sequestering