Eur. Phys. J. C (2017) 77: 848
https://doi.org/10.1140/epjc/s10052-017-5397-1

Regular Article - Theoretical Physics

A nearly cylindrically symmetric source in Brans–Dicke gravity as the generator of the rotational curves of the galaxies

¹ Universidade Estadual Paulista Júlio de Mesquita Filho-UNESP, Campus de Guaratinguetá, Guaratinguetá, SP, 12516-410, Brazil
² Instituto Federal de Educação, Ciência e Tecnologia do Rio Grande do Sul-IFRS, Campus Porto Alegre, Porto Alegre, RS, 90030-041, Brazil
³ Instituto de Física, Universidade Federal Fluminense-UFF, Av. Gal. Milton Tavares de Souza, s/n, Niterói, RJ, 24210-346, Brazil
⁴ Instituto de Física, Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro-UFRJ, Av. Athos da Silveira Ramos, 149, Cidade Universitária, Rio de Janeiro, RJ, 21941-909, Brazil

^* e-mail: sergio.santos@poa.ifrs.edu.br

Received: 28 August 2017
Accepted: 20 November 2017
Published online: 8 December 2017

Abstract

Observation shows that the velocities of stars grow by approximately 2–3 orders of magnitude when the distances from the centers of the galaxies are in the range of 0.5–82.3 kpc, before they begin to tend to a constant value. Up to now, the reason for this behavior is still a matter for debate. In this work, we propose a model which adequately describes this unusual behavior using a (nearly) cylindrical symmetrical solution in the framework of a scalar–tensor-like (the Brans–Dicke model) theory of gravity.