International Association for
Relativistic Dynamics

Abstract

A mechanical model of spacetime was introduced at a prior conference for describing perturbations of stress, strain, and displacement within a metric of spacetime exhibiting surface tension. In the prior work, equations governing metric dynamics suggest an alternate formulation for quantum mechanics. Analogies were drawn between micro-perturbations in spacetime geometry and the wave equations of quantum mechanics. At a second conference, the model was extended to include gravity by proposing an anisotropic coupling tensor to relate stress-energy and curvature instead of the Einstein constant. In this presentation, the model is applied to cosmology. The relationship between matter density and surface tension is explained through known principles of thermodynamics and physical chemistry of surfaces. It is shown that the equations of surface tension can be rearranged such that they contain terms resembling dark matter and dark energy. This form of the model is compared with galaxy rotation curves. It is shown that surface tension causes flattening of rotation curves. The model is also evaluated using Friedman Robertson Walker metrics. It is shown that the proposed anisotropic coupling constant trends to a flat, homogeneous, isotropic universe geometry. It is suggested that dark matter and dark energy are the cosmological manifestations of surface tension in spacetime.