  For the 2-brane Randall-Sundrum model, we calculate the bulk geometry for
strong gravity, in the low matter density regime, for slowly varying matter
sources. This is relevant for astrophysical or cosmological applications. The
warped compactification means the radion can not be written as a homogeneous
mode in the orbifold coordinate, and we introduce it by extending the
coordinate patch approach of the linear theory to the non-linear case. The
negative tension brane is taken to be in vacuum. For conformally invariant
matter on the positive tension brane, we solve the bulk geometry as a
derivative expansion, formally summing the `Kaluza-Klein' contributions to all
orders. For general matter we compute the Einstein equations to leading order,
finding a scalar-tensor theory with $\omega(\Psi) \propto \Psi / (1 - \Psi)$,
and geometrically interpret the radion. We comment that this radion scalar may
become large in the context of strong gravity with low density matter.
Equations of state allowing $(\rho - 3 P)$ to be negative, can exhibit behavior
where the matter decreases the distance between the 2 branes, which we
illustrate numerically for static star solutions using an incompressible fluid.
For increasing stellar density, the branes become close before the upper mass
limit, but after violation of the dominant energy condition. This raises the
interesting question of whether astrophysically reasonable matter, and initial
data, could cause branes to collide at low energy, such as in dynamical
collapse.
