Session F2 - Focus Session: Phenomenology of Quantum Gravity.
FOCUS session, Saturday evening, April 05
Commonwealth A, Loews Philadelphia Hotel
Two theories of special relativity with an extra invariant scale, or ``doubly special relativity" (DSR), are tested with exact calculations of particle kinematics. Using modified conservation laws and a number of particle processes, one theory (DSR2) is shown to lower existing special relativistic thresholds and to allow no additional processes. The other (DSR1) is shown to modify the results of special relativity both in terms of the thresholds for allowed processes but also in the existence of additional solutions to process thresholds, even when forbidden by special relativity. The relativity principle is discussed in light of these results.