Geometrical deformation of brane matter field within f(R, Q, P) gravity

Abstract In the context of braneworld scenarios, the real scalar field plays a crucial role by providing thickness for brane. In this work, we investigate a codimension-one thick brane within the framework of f ( R , Q , P ) gravity, where R represents the curvature scalar, while $$Q=R_{\mu \nu }R^{\mu \nu }$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> <mml:mrow> <mml:mi>Q</mml:mi> <mml:mo>=</mml:mo> <mml:msub> <mml:mi>R</mml:mi> <mml:mrow> <mml:mi>μ</mml:mi> <mml:mi>ν</mml:mi> </mml:mrow> </mml:msub> <mml:msup> <mml:mi>R</mml:mi> <mml:mrow> <mml:mi>μ</mml:mi> <mml:mi>ν</mml:mi> </mml:mrow> </mml:msup> </mml:mrow> </mml:math> and $$P=R_{\mu \nu \alpha \beta }R^{\mu \nu \alpha \beta }$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> <mml:mrow> <mml:mi>P</mml:mi> <mml:mo>=</mml:mo> <mml:msub> <mml:mi>R</mml:mi> <mml:mrow> <mml:mi>μ</mml:mi> <mml:mi>ν</mml:mi> <mml:mi>α</mml:mi> <mml:mi>β</mml:mi> </mml:mrow> </mml:msub> <mml:msup> <mml:mi>R</mml:mi> <mml:mrow> <mml:mi>μ</mml:mi> <mml:mi>ν</mml:mi> <mml:mi>α</mml:mi> <mml:mi>β</mml:mi> </mml:mrow> </mml:msup> </mml:mrow> </mml:math> are quadratic geometric invariants. Our interest is to investigate the influence of these invariants on the scalar field solution and the energy density of the brane. Furthermore, we analyze the localization of spin 1/2 fermions and the gravitino by employing a Yukawa-like coupling with the scalar field background. Such a coupling is able to produce a normalizable zero-mode for both fields.