Rainbows without unicorns: Metric structures in theories with Modified Dispersion Relations

Abstract

Rainbow metrics are a widely used approach to metric formalism for theories with Modified Dispersion Relations. They have had a huge success in the Quantum Gravity Phenomenology literature, since they allow to introduce momentum-dependent spacetime metrics into the description of systems with Modified Dispersion Relation. In this paper, we introduce the reader to some realizations of this general idea: the original Rainbow metrics proposal, the momentum-space-inspired metric, the standard Finsler geometry approach and our alternative definition of a four-velocity-dependent metric with a massless limit. This paper aims to highlight some of their properties and how to properly describe their relativistic realizations.

10 pages. Discussion on the role of connections was added. Matches published version