Cosmological Constant and Supergravity Soft Terms

Abstract

In supergravity models, the quantum correction to the vacuum energy can be of order $M_I^4$, if the cutoff is of order the Planck mass $M^2_{P}$ and $Str\ {\cal M}^2\ne 0$. Therefore, the tree level cosmological constant must be nonzero (probably negative). Since the current practice of calculating soft parameters in supergravity models assumes the vanishing tree level cosmological constant, the supergravity calculation must be accordingly modified. This implies that the soft parameters in supergravity has an additional contribution depending on the nonvanishing tree level cosmological constant. A simple quantum mechanical model mimicking this situation is also presented.