We demonstrate that loop integrands of (super-)gravity scattering amplitudes possess surprising properties in the ultraviolet (UV) region. In particular, we study the scaling of multi-particle unitarity cuts for asymptotically large momenta and expose an improved UV behavior of four-dimensional cuts through seven loops as compared to standard expectations. For N=8 supergravity, we show that the improved large momentum scaling combined with the behavior of the integrand under BCFW deformations of external kinematics uniquely fixes the loop integrands in a number of non-trivial cases. In the integrand construction, all scaling conditions are homogeneous. Therefore, the only required information about the amplitude is its vanishing at particular points in momentum space. This homogeneous construction gives indirect evidence for a new geometric picture for graviton amplitudes similar to the one found for planar N=4 super Yang-Mills theory. We also show how the behavior at infinity is related to the scaling of tree-level amplitudes under certain multi-line chiral shifts which can be used to construct new recursion relations.
We use the duality between color and kinematics to simplify the construction of the complete four-loop four-point amplitude of N=4 super-Yang-Mills theory, including the nonplanar contributions. The duality completely determines the amplitude's integrand in terms of just two planar graphs. The existence of a manifestly dual gauge-theory amplitude trivializes the construction of the corresponding N=8 supergravity integrand, whose graph numerators are double copies (squares) of the N=4 super-Yang-Mills numerators. The success of this procedure provides further nontrivial evidence that the dualit…
In this work we explore the properties of four-dimensional gravity integrands at large loop momenta. This analysis can not be done directly for the full off-shell integrand but only becomes well-defined on cuts that allow us to unambiguously specify labels for the loop variables. The ultraviolet region of scattering amplitudes originates from poles at infinity of the loop integrands and we show that in gravity these integcrands conceal a number of surprising features. In particular, certain poles at infinity are absent which requires a conspiracy between individual Feynman integrals contributi…
We describe a systematic approach to the construction of loop-integrand bases at arbitrary loop-order, sufficient for the representation of general quantum field theories. We provide a graph-theoretic definition of `power-counting' for multi-loop integrands beyond the planar limit, and show how this can be used to organize bases according to ultraviolet behavior. This allows amplitude integrands to be constructed iteratively. We illustrate these ideas with concrete applications. In particular, we describe complete integrand bases at two loops sufficient to represent arbitrary-multiplicity ampl…
The duality between color and kinematics enables the construction of multiloop gravity integrands directly from corresponding gauge-theory integrands. This has led to new nontrivial insights into the structure of gravity theories, including the discovery of enhanced ultraviolet cancellations. To continue to gain deeper understandings and probe these new properties, it is crucial to further improve techniques for constructing multiloop gravity integrands. In this paper, we show by example how one can alleviate difficulties encountered at the multiloop level by relaxing the color-kinematics dual…
In this letter, we extend the tree-level Kawai--Lewellen--Tye (KLT) and Bern--Carrasco--Johansson (BCJ) amplitude relations to loop integrands of gauge theory and gravity. By rearranging the propagators of gauge and gravity loop integrands, we propose the first manifestly gauge- and diffeomorphism invariant formulation of their double-copy relations. The one-loop KLT formula expresses gravity integrands in terms of more basic gauge invariant building blocks for gauge-theory amplitudes, dubbed partial integrands. The latter obey a one-loop analogue of the BCJ relations, and both KLT and BCJ rel…
Examples of "enhanced ultraviolet cancellations" with no known standard-symmetry explanation have been found in a variety of supergravity theories. By examining one- and two-loop examples in four- and five-dimensional half-maximal supergravity, we argue that enhanced cancellations in general cannot be exhibited prior to integration. In light of this, we explore reorganizations of integrands into parts that are manifestly finite and parts that have poor power counting but integrate to zero due to integral identities. At two loops we find that in the large loop-momentum limit the required integr…
We use the recently developed generalized double-copy procedure to construct an integrand for the five-loop four-point amplitude of N=8 supergravity. This construction starts from a naive double copy of the previously computed corresponding amplitude of N=4 super-Yang-Mills theory. This is then systematically modified by adding contact terms generated in the context of the method of maximal unitarity cuts. For the simpler generalized cuts, whose corresponding contact terms tend to be the most complicated, we derive a set of formulas relating the contact contributions to the violations of the d…
Whenever the integrand of a gauge-theory loop amplitude can be arranged into a form where the BCJ duality between color and kinematics is manifest, a corresponding gravity integrand can be obtained simply via the double-copy procedure. However, finding such gauge-theory representations can be challenging, especially at high loop orders. Here we show that we can instead start from generic gauge-theory integrands, where the duality is not manifest, and apply a modified double-copy procedure to obtain gravity integrands that include contact terms generated by violations of dual Jacobi identities.…
We use the recently developed generalized double-copy construction to obtain an improved representation of the five-loop four-point integrand of $N = 8$ supergravity whose leading ultraviolet behavior we analyze using state of the art loop-integral expansion and reduction methods. We find that the five-loop critical dimension where ultraviolet divergences first occur is $D_c=24/5$, corresponding to a $D^8 R^4$ counterterm. This ultraviolet behavior stands in contrast to the cases of four-dimensional $N = 4$ supergravity at three loops and $N = 5$ supergravity at four loops whose improved ultra…
We demonstrate that pure N=4 supergravity is ultraviolet divergent at four loops. The form of the divergence suggests that it is due to the rigid U(1) duality-symmetry anomaly of the theory. This is the first known example of an ultraviolet divergence in a pure ungauged supergravity theory in four dimensions. We use the duality between color and kinematics to construct the integrand of the four-loop four-point amplitude, whose ultraviolet divergence is then extracted by standard integration techniques.
An elegant unified web for amplitudes of various theories was given by Cachazo, He and Yuan in the CHY framework a few years ago. Recently, similar web has also been constructed by Cheung, Shen and Wen, which relies on a set of differential operators. In this note, by acting these differential operators on CHY-integrands systematically, we have established the relation between these two approaches. Thus, amplitudes for all theories which have CHY representations, include gravity theory, Einstein-Yang-Mills theory, Einstein-Maxwell theory, pure Yang-Mills theory, Yang-Mills-scalar theory, Born-…
The connection of maximally supersymmetric Yang-Mills theory to the (2,0) theory in six dimensions has raised the possibility that it might be perturbatively ultraviolet finite in five dimensions. We test this hypothesis by computing the coefficient of the first potential ultraviolet divergence of planar (large N_c) maximally supersymmetric Yang-Mills theory in D = 5, which occurs at six loops. We show that the coefficient is nonvanishing. Furthermore, the numerical value of the divergence falls very close to an approximate exponential formula based on the coefficients of the divergences throu…
We show that the four-loop four-point amplitudes of N = 5 supergravity are ultraviolet finite in four dimensions, contrary to expectations based on supersymmetry and duality-symmetry arguments. We explain why the diagrams of any covariant local formalism cannot manifestly exhibit the necessary cancellations for finiteness but instead require a new type of nontrivial ultraviolet cancellation that we call "enhanced cancellations". We also show that the three-loop four-point amplitudes in N = 4 and N = 5 supergravity theories display enhanced cancellations. To construct the loop integrand, we use…
The notion of a unique integrand does not a priori makes sense in field theory: different Feynman diagrams have different loop momenta and there should be no reason to compare them. In string theory, however, a global integrand is natural and allows, for instance, to make explicit the separation between left and right-moving degrees of freedom. However, the significance of this integrand had not really been investigated so far. It is even more important in view of the recently discovered loop monodromies that are related to the duality between color and kinematics in gauge and gravity loop amp…
The scattering equations on the Riemann sphere give rise to remarkable formulae for tree-level gauge theory and gravity amplitudes. Adamo, Casali and Skinner conjectured a one-loop formula for supergravity amplitudes based on scattering equations on a torus. We use a residue theorem to transform this into a formula on the Riemann sphere. What emerges is a framework for loop integrands on the Riemann sphere that promises to have wide application, based on off-shell scattering equations that depend on the loop momentum. We present new formulae, checked explicitly at low points, for supergravity …
A power counting rule is provided that allows us to obtain upper bounds for the absolute values of Feynman parametric integrands. The rule reflects both the ultraviolet and infrared behavior taking into account that the external momenta are on the mass shell. It gives us the ability to rigorously prove the absolute convergence of the corresponding integrals. The consideration is limited to the case of the quantum electrodynamics Feynman graphs contributing to the lepton magnetic moments and not containing either lepton loops or ultraviolet divergent subgraphs. However, a rigorous mathematical …
We construct the complete (planar and non-planar) integrand for the six-loop four-point amplitude in maximal $D\le10$ super-Yang-Mills. This construction employs new advances that combat the proliferation of diagram contributions and state sums when evaluating multi-loop $D$-dimensional unitarity cuts. Concretely, we introduce two graph-based approaches to evaluating generalized unitarity cuts in $D$ dimensions: 1) recursively from lower-loop cuts, or 2) directly from known higher-loop planar cuts. Neither method relies on explicit state sums or any sewing of tree-level amplitudes. These metho…
We explain a procedure to manifest the Bern-Carrasco-Johansson duality between color and kinematics in $n$-point one-loop amplitudes of a variety of supersymmetric gauge theories. Explicit amplitude representations are constructed through a systematic reorganization of the integrands in the Cachazo-He-Yuan formalism. Our construction holds for any nonzero number of supersymmetries and does not depend on the number of spacetime dimensions. The cancellations from supersymmetry multiplets in the loop as well as the resulting power counting of loop momenta is manifested along the lines of the corr…
We present a compact formula for the complete tree-level S-matrix of pure Yang-Mills and gravity theories in arbitrary spacetime dimension. The new formula for the scattering of n particles is given by an integral over the position of n points on a sphere restricted to satisfy a dimension-independent set of equations. The integrand is constructed using the reduced Pfaffian of a 2n by 2n matrix that depends on momenta and polarization vectors. In its simplest form, the gravity integrand is a reduced determinant which is the square of the Pfaffian in the Yang-Mills integrand. Gauge invariance is…
The quantum effects encapsulated in loop corrections are crucial in quantum field theory for a wide variety of formal and phenomenological applications. In this article we propose and check a definition of the so-called single cut contributions needed to complete on-shell recursion relations for the integrand of scattering amplitudes in generic power-counting renormalisable theories at conjecturally any loop order. Our proposal meshes well with standard dimensional regularisation and applies in particular directly to much of the standard model of particle physics. Apart from a diagrammatic con…
Using the method of maximal cuts, we construct the complete D-dimensional integrand of the five-loop four-point amplitude of N = 4 super-Yang-Mills theory, including nonplanar contributions. In the critical dimension where this amplitude becomes ultraviolet divergent, we present a compact explicit expression for the nonvanishing ultraviolet divergence in terms of three vacuum integrals. This construction provides a crucial step towards obtaining the corresponding amplitude of N = 8 supergravity useful for resolving the general ultraviolet behavior of supergravity theories.
We formulate a renormalizable quantum gravity in $2+ε$ dimensions by generalizing the nonlinear sigma model approach to string theory. We find that the theory possesses the ultraviolet stable fixed point if the central charge of the matter sector is in the range $0~<~c~<~25$. This may imply the existence of consistent quantum gravity theory in 3 and 4 dimensions. We compute the scaling dimensions of the relevant operators in the theory at the ultraviolet fixed point. We obtain a scaling relation between the cosmological constant and the gravitational constant, which is crucial for searching fo…
Two very different formulations of the tree-level S-matrix of N=8 Einstein supergravity in terms of rational maps are known to exist. In both formulations, the computation of a scattering amplitude of n particles in the k R-charge sector involves an integral over the moduli space of certain holomorphic maps of degree d=k-1. In this paper we show that both formulations can be simplified when written in a manifestly parity invariant form as integrals over holomorphic maps of bi-degree (d,n-d-2). In one formulation the full integrand becomes directly the product of the resultants of each of the t…
In the low-energy effective action of string theories, non-abelian gauge interactions and supergravity are augmented by infinite towers of higher-mass-dimension operators. We propose a new method to construct one-loop matrix elements with insertions of operators $D^{2k} F^n$ and $D^{2k} R^n$ in the tree-level effective action of type-I and type-II superstrings. Inspired by ambitwistor string theories, our method is based on forward limits of moduli-space integrals using string tree-level amplitudes with two extra points, expanded in powers of the inverse string tension $α'$. Similar to one-loo…
Using color-kinematics duality, we construct for the first time the full integrand of the five-loop Sudakov form factor in N=4 super-Yang-Mills theory, including non-planar contributions. This result also provides a first manifestation of the color-kinematics duality at five loops. The integrand is explicitly ultraviolet finite when D<26/5, coincident with the known finiteness bound for amplitudes. If the double-copy method could be applied to the form factor, this would indicate an interesting ultraviolet finiteness bound for N=8 supergravity at five loops. The result is also expected to prov…
This work presents a study of the possibility for extending the well-known results of E.Verlinde concerning the entropic nature of gravity to the ultraviolet region (Planck's energies) and also the derivation of quantum corrections to Einstein Equations
We discuss the existence and properties of a nontrivial fixed point in f(R)-gravity, where f is a polynomial of order up to six. Within this seven-parameter class of theories, the fixed point has three ultraviolet-attractive and four ultraviolet-repulsive directions; this brings further support to the hypothesis that gravity is nonperturbatively renormalizabile.
An ultraviolet complete quantum gravity theory is formulated in which vertex functions in Feynman graphs are entire functions and the propagating graviton is described by a local, causal propagator. The cosmological constant problem is investigated in the context of the ultraviolet complete quantum gravity.
We propose new formulae for the two-loop n-point D-dimensional integrands of scattering amplitudes in Yang-Mills theory and gravity. The loop integrands are written as a double-forward limit of tree-level trivalent diagrams, and are inferred from the formalism of the two-loop scattering equations. We discuss the relationship between the formulae for non-supersymmetric theories and the Neveu-Schwarz sector of the formulae for maximally supersymmetric theories, which can be derived from ambitwistor strings. An important property of the loop integrands is that they are expressed in a representati…
The non-trivial ultraviolet fixed point in quantum gravity is calculated by means of the exact renormalization group equation in d-dimensions $(2\simeq d\leq4)$. It is shown that the ultraviolet non-Gaussian fixed point which is expected from the perturbatively $ε$-expanded calculations in $2+ε$ gravity theory remains in d=4. Hence it is possible that quantum gravity is an asymptotically safe theory and renormalizable in 2<d.
Recent computations of scattering amplitudes show that N=8 supergravity is surprisingly well behaved in the ultraviolet and may even be ultraviolet finite in perturbation theory. The novel cancellations necessary for ultraviolet finiteness first appear at one loop in the guise of the "no-triangle hypothesis". We study one-loop amplitudes in pure Einstein gravity and point out the existence of cancellations similar to those found previously in N=8 supergravity. These cancellations go beyond those found in the one-loop effective action. Using unitarity, this suggests that generic theories of qua…
In this work we investigate the ultraviolet behavior of Euclidean four-derivative quantum gravity beyond perturbation theory. In addition to a perturbative fixed point, we find an ultraviolet fixed point that is non-trivial in all couplings and is described by only two free parameters. This result is in line with the asymptotic safety scenario in quantum gravity. In particular, it supports the conjecture that the full theory is described by a finite number of free parameters.
We extend the applications of prescriptive unitarity beyond the planar limit to provide local, polylogarithmic, integrand-level representations of six-particle MHV scattering amplitudes in both maximally supersymmetric Yang-Mills theory and gravity. The integrand basis we construct is diagonalized on a spanning set of non-vanishing leading singularities that ensures the manifest matching of all soft-collinear singularities in both theories. As a consequence, this integrand basis naturally splits into infrared-finite and infrared-divergent parts, with hints toward an integrand-level exponentiat…
We study soft theorems in a broader context, addressing their fate at loop level and their universality in effective field theories and string theory. We argue that for gauge theories in the planar limit, loop-level soft gluon theorems can be made manifest already at the integrand level. In particular, we show that the planar integrand for N=4 SYM satisfies the tree-level soft theorem to all orders in perturbation theory and provide strong evidence to this effect for integrands in N<4 SYM. We consider soft theorems for non-supersymmetric Yang-Mills theories and gravity, and show the validity o…
We derive a link representation for all tree amplitudes in N=8 supergravity, from a recent conjecture by Cachazo and Skinner. The new formula explicitly writes amplitudes as contour integrals over constrained link variables, with an integrand naturally expressed in terms of determinants, or equivalently tree diagrams. Important symmetries of the amplitude, such as supersymmetry, parity and (partial) permutation invariance, are kept manifest in the formulation. We also comment on rewriting the formula in a GL(k)-invariant manner, which may serve as a starting point for the generalization to pos…
We study the short distance behaviour of euclidean quantum gravity in the light of Weinberg's asymptotic safety scenario. Implications of a non-trivial ultraviolet fixed point are reviewed. Based on an optimised renormalisation group, we provide analytical flow equations in the Einstein-Hilbert truncation. A non-trivial ultraviolet fixed point is found for arbitrary dimension. We discuss a bifurcation pattern in the spectrum of eigenvalues at criticality, and the large dimensional limit of quantum gravity. Implications for quantum gravity in higher dimensions are indicated.
We present new and explicit formulae for the one-loop integrands of scattering amplitudes in non-supersymmetric gauge theory and gravity, valid for any number of particles. The results exhibit the colour-kinematics duality in gauge theory and the double-copy relation to gravity, in a form that was recently observed in supersymmetric theories. The new formulae are expressed in a particular representation of the loop integrand, with only one quadratic propagator, which arises naturally from the framework of the loop-level scattering equations. The starting point in our work are the expressions b…
In order to obtain the analytic expression of an amplitude from a generic CHY-integrand, a new algorithm based on the so-called cross-ratio identities has been proposed recently. In this paper, we apply this new approach to a variety of theories including: non-linear sigma model, special Galileon theory, pure Yang-Mills theory, pure gravity, Born-Infeld theory, Dirac-Born-Infeld theory and its extension, Yang-Mills-scalar theory, Einstein-Maxwell theory as well as Einstein-Yang-Mills theory. CHY-integrands of these theories which contain higher-order poles can be calculated conveniently by usi…
Concrete calculations have pointed out that amplitudes in perturbative gravity exhibit unanticipated cancellations taming their ultraviolet behaviour independently of supersymmetry. Similar ultraviolet behaviour of N=4 super-Yang-Mills and N=8 maximal supergravity has explicitly been observed until three loops. These cancellations can be connected to two manifest features of gravitational theories: firstly gauge invariance from diffeomorphism symmetries and secondly that amplitudes are colourless and exhibits crossing symmetry. We will give a simple physical explanation of the cancellations ex…
Second-order-derivative plus fourth-order-derivative gravity is the ultraviolet completion of second-order-derivative quantum Einstein gravity. While it achieves renormalizability through states of negative Dirac norm, the unitarity violation that this would entail can be postponed to Planck energies. As we show in this paper the theory has a different problem, one that occurs at all energy scales, namely that the Dirac norm of the vacuum of the theory is not finite. To establish this we present a procedure for determining the norm of the vacuum in any quantum field theory. With the Dirac norm…
We study the Faddeev-Popov ghost sector of asymptotically safe quantum gravity, which becomes non-perturbative in the ultraviolet. We point out that nonzero matter-ghost couplings and higher-order ghost self-interactions exist at a non-Gaussian fixed point for the gravitational couplings, i.e., in the ultraviolet. Thus the ghost sector in this non-perturbative ultraviolet completion does not keep the structure of a simple Faddeev-Popov determinant. We discuss implications of the new ghost couplings for the Renormalization Group flow in gravity, the form of the ultraviolet completion, and the r…
Horava gravity is a proposal for completing general relativity in the ultraviolet by interactions that violate Lorentz invariance at very high energies. We focus on (2+1)-dimensional projectable Horava gravity, a theory which is renormalizable and perturbatively ultraviolet-complete, enjoying an asymptotically free ultraviolet fixed point. Adding a small cosmological constant to regulate the long distance behavior of the metric, we search for all circularly symmetric stationary vacuum solutions with vanishing angular momentum and approaching the de Sitter metric with a possible angle deficit a…
We study ultraviolet cutoffs associated with the Weak Gravity Conjecture (WGC) and Sublattice Weak Gravity Conjecture (sLWGC). There is a magnetic WGC cutoff at the energy scale $e G_N^{-1/2}$ with an associated sLWGC tower of charged particles. A more fundamental cutoff is the scale at which gravity becomes strong and field theory breaks down entirely. By clarifying the nature of the sLWGC for nonabelian gauge groups we derive a parametric upper bound on this strong gravity scale for arbitrary gauge theories. Intriguingly, we show that in theories approximately saturating the sLWGC, the scale…
Indefinite causal structure is generically present in theories of quantum gravity admitting a path integral formulation. We show that summing over causal structures eliminates ultraviolet divergences of matter QFT and resolves spacetime singularities using the non-perturbative World Quantum Gravity approach. Independent information-theoretic and model-independent considerations suggest that the mechanism of ultraviolet regularization by indefinite causal structure also applies to other theories of quantum gravity.
In this Letter we derive the gravity field equations by varying the action for an ultraviolet complete quantum gravity. Then we consider the case of a static source term and we determine an exact black hole solution. As a result we find a regular spacetime geometry: in place of the conventional curvature singularity extreme energy fluctuations of the gravitational field at small length scales provide an effective cosmological constant in a region locally described in terms of a de Sitter space. We show that the new metric coincides with the noncommutative geometry inspired Schwarzschild black …
The structure of the divergences for transverse theories of gravity is studied to one-loop order. These theories are invariant only under those diffeomorphisms that enjoy unit Jacobian determinant (TDiff), so that the determinant of the metric transforms as a true scalar instead of a density. Generically, the models include an additional scalar degree of freedom contained in the metric besides the usual spin two component. When the cosmological constant is fine tuned to zero, there are only two theories which are on shell finite, namely the one in which the symmetry is enhanced to the full gro…
We highlight how the existence of an ultraviolet completion for interacting Standard-Model type matter puts constraints on the viable microscopic dynamics of asymptotically safe quantum gravity within truncated Renormalization Group flows. A first constraint -- the weak-gravity bound -- is rooted in the destruction of quantum scale-invariance in the matter system by strong quantum-gravity fluctuations. A second constraint arises by linking Planck-scale dynamics to the dynamics at the electroweak scale. Specifically, we delineate how to extract a prediction of the top quark mass from asymptotic…
We study the ultraviolet stability of gravity-matter systems for general numbers of minimally coupled scalars and fermions. This is done within the functional renormalisation group setup put forward in \cite{Christiansen:2015rva} for pure gravity. It includes full dynamical propagators and a genuine dynamical Newton's coupling, which is extracted from the graviton three-point function. We find ultraviolet stability of general gravity-fermion systems. Gravity-scalar systems are also found to be ultraviolet stable within validity bounds for the chosen generic class of regulators, based on the si…
This letter constructs, making use of the on-shell spinor-helicity formalism, a possible ultraviolet completion of gravity following a "bottom-up" approach. The assumptions of locality, unitarity and causality i) require an infinite tower of resonances with increasing spin and quantized mass, ii) introduce a duality relation among crossed scattering channels, and iii) dress all gravitational amplitudes in the Standard Model with a form factor that closely resembles either the Veneziano or the Virasoro-Shapiro amplitude in string theory. As a consequence of unitarity, the theory predicts leadin…
