Junction conditions in quadratic gravity: thin shells and double layers

Abstract: The junction conditions for the most general gravitational theory with a Lagrangian containing terms quadratic in the curvature are derived. We include the cases with a possible concentration of matter on the joining hypersurface -termed as thin shells, domain walls or braneworlds in the literature- as well as the proper matching conditions where only finite jumps of the energy-momentum tensor are allowed. In the latter case we prove that the matching conditions are more demanding than in General Relativity. In the former case, we show that generically the shells/domain walls are of a new kind because they possess, in addition to the standard energy-momentum tensor, a double layer energy-momentum contribution which actually induces an external energy flux vector and an external scalar pressure/tension on the shell. We prove that all these contributions are necessary to make the entire energy-momentum tensor divergence-free, and we present the field equations satisfied by these energy-momentum quantities. The consequences of all these results are briefly analyzed.