Gravity curves spacetime. In regions where the de Broglie wavelength is very small compared to the curvature of spacetime, the wave equations in flat spacetime can be generalized to curved spacetime. The validity of the formulation when the de Broglie wavelength becomes comparable to the curvature is an open question. To test these formulations experimentally, huge energy of the order of the Planck mass would be required. Euclideanized spacetime is used to model thermal systems.
In this work, an equivalence between spatial variation of temperature in thermal baths and curvature of Euclideanized spacetime is propounded. The variation in temperature is recast as a variation in the metric. The Dirac equation is then solved in this curved Euclideanized spacetime. The curvature in Euclideanized spacetime can be obtained in Chromodynamic or Electromagnetic scale energies. If this equivalence is correct, it could provide a platform to experimentally explore quantum mechanics in curved spacetime.
According to the Matrix theory proposal of Banks, Fischler, Shenker and Susskind M-theory in the infinite momentum frame is the large N limit of super Yang-Mills theory in a flat background. To address some physical issues of classical gravity such as gravitational collapse and cosmological expansion we consider an extension of the BFSS proposal by defining M-theory in curved space as the large N limit of super Yang-Mills theory in a curved background. Motivations and possible implications of this extension are discussed.
After a critical overview of the Generalized Uncertainty Principle (GUP) applied to compact objects, we propose a texture of Heisenberg uncertainty principle in curved spacetimes (CHUP). CHUP allows to write down physically motivated STUR (spacetime uncertainty relations) in a generic background for a non commutative spacetime in terms of tetrad variables. In order to study possible quantum effects for compact astrophysical objects as white dwarf, neutron stars and black holes, an expression for quantum fluctuations is outlined. As a result, contrary to GUP-based claims, we found no evidence f…
A method to regularize and renormalize the fluctuations of a quantum field in a curved background in the $ζ$-function approach is presented. The method produces finite quantities directly and finite scale-parametrized counterterms at most. These finite couterterms are related to the presence of a particular pole of the effective-action $ζ$ function as well as to the heat kernel coefficients. The method is checked in several examples obtaining known or reasonable results. Finally, comments are given for as it concerns the recent proposal by Frolov et al. to get the finite Bekenstein-Hawking ent…
Afshordi, Aslanbeigi and Sorkin have recently proposed a construction of a distinguished "S-J state" for scalar field theory in (bounded regions of) general curved spacetimes. We establish rigorously that the proposal is well-defined on globally hyperbolic spacetimes or spacetime regions that can be embedded as relatively compact subsets of other globally hyperbolic spacetimes, and also show that, whenever the proposal is well-defined, it yields a pure quasifree state. However, by explicitly considering portions of ultrastatic spacetimes, we show that the S-J state is not in general a Hadamard…
We discuss Gubser-Klebanov-Polyakov proposal for the gauge/string theory correspondence for gauge theories in curved space. Specifically, we consider Klebanov-Tseytlin cascading gauge theory compactified on S^3. We explain regime when this gauge theory is a small deformation of the superconformal N=1 gauge theory on the world volume of regular D3-branes at the tip of the conifold. We study closed string states on the leading Regge trajectory in this background, and attempt to identify the dual gauge theory twist two operators.
The issue of the vacuum energy of quantum fields is briefly reviewed. It is argued that this energy is normally either much too large or much too small to account for the dark energy, However, there are a few proposals in which it would be of the order needed to effect the dynamics of the present day universe. Backreaction models are reviewed, and the question of whether quantum effects can react against a cosmological constant is discussed.
A recently proposed step-by-step procedure, to merge the low-energy physics of the $π$-bonds electrons of graphene, and quantum field theory on curved spacetimes, is recalled. The last step there is the proposal of an experiment to test a Hawking-Unruh effect, emerging from the model, that manifests itself as an exact (within the model) prediction for the electronic local density of states, in the ideal case of the graphene membrane shaped as a Beltrami pseudosphere. A discussion about one particular attempt to experimentally test the model on molecular graphene is presented, and it is taken a…
Applying the loop variable proposal to a sigma model (with boundary) in a curved target space, we give a systematic method for writing the gauge and generally covariant interacting equations of motion for the modes of the open string in a curved background. As in the free case described in an earlier paper, the equations are obtained by covariantizing the flat space (gauge invariant) interacting equations and then demanding gauge invariance in the curved background. The resulting equation has the form of a sum of terms that would individually be gauge invariant in flat space or at zero interac…
The $T \bar T$ deformation of a 2 dimensional field theory living on a curved spacetime is equivalent to coupling the undeformed field theory to 2 dimensional `ghost-free' massive gravity. We derive the equivalence classically, and using a path integral formulation of the random geometries proposal, which mirrors the holographic bulk cutoff picture. We emphasize the role of the massive gravity \stu fields which describe the diffeomorphism between the two metrics. For a general field theory, the dynamics of the \stu fields is non-trivial, however for a CFT it trivializes and becomes equivalent …
On the example of a free massless and conformally coupled scalar field, it is argued that in quantum field theory in curved spacetimes with time-like Killing field, the corresponding KMS states (generalized Gibbs ensembles) at parameter β>0 need not possess a definite temperature in the sense of the zeroth law. In fact, these states, although passive in the sense of the second law, are not always in local thermal equilibrium (LTE). A criterion characterizing LTE states with sharp local temperature is discussed. Moreover, a proposal is made for fixing the renormalization freedom of composite fi…
In this work a proposal for definition of twistors on generic curved spaces is exposed and investigated. We consider superpositions of nearly autoparallel and nearly geodesic maps (nearly conformal maps, nc-maps) of (pseudo-)Riemannian spaces as generalizations of conformal transforms. We introduce the nearly autoparallel twistor equations being compatible on nc-flat spaces and study nearly autoparallel twistor structures generating curved spaces and vacuum Einstein equations.
Much attention has been recently devoted to the possibility that quantum gravity effects could lead to departures from Special Relativity in the form of a deformed Poincarè algebra. These proposals go generically under the name of Doubly or Deformed Special Relativity (DSR). In this article we further explore a recently proposed class of quantum field theories, involving noncanonically commuting complex scalar fields, which have been shown to entail a DSR-like symmetry. An open issue for such theories is whether the DSR-like symmetry has to be taken as a physically relevant symmetry, or if in …
We study the interaction, in general curved spacetime, between a spinor and a scalar field describing dark energy; the so-called DE$_ν$ model in curved space. The dominant term is the dimension 5 operator, which results in different energy shifts for the neutrino states: an Aharonov-Bohm-like effect. We study the phenomenology of this term and make observational predictions to detect dark energy interactions in the laboratory due to its effect on neutrino oscillation experiments, which opens up the possibility of designing underground experiments to detect dark energy. This dimension 5 operato…
We review recent results regarding entanglement in quantum fields in cosmological spacetimes and related phenomena in flat spacetime such as the Unruh effect. We being with a summary of important results about field entanglement and the mathematics of Bogoliubov transformations that is very often used to describe it. We then discuss the Unruh-DeWitt detector model, which is a useful model of a generic local particle detector. This detector model has been successfully used as a tool to obtain many important results. In this context we discuss two specific types of these detectors: a qubit and a…
The presence of noncyclic geometric invariant is revealed in all the phenomena where particle generation from vacuum or vacuum condensates appear. Aharonov--Anandan invariants then can help to study such systems and can represent a new tool to be used in order to provide laboratory evidence of phenomena particulary hard to be detected, such as Hawking and Unruh effects and some features of quantum field theory in curved space simulated by some graphene morphologies. It is finally suggested that a very precise quantum thermometer can be built by exploiting geometric invariants properties.
Using the observed time and spatial intervals defined originally by Einstein and the observation frame in the vierbein formalism, we propose that in curved spacetime, for a wave received in laboratories, the observed frequency is the changing rate of the phase of the wave relative to the local observable time scale and the momentum the changing rate of the phase relative to the local observable spatial length scale. The case of Robertson-Walker universe is especially considered.
Path integrals for particles in curved spaces can be used to compute trace anomalies in quantum field theories, and more generally to study properties of quantum fields coupled to gravity in first quantization. While their construction in arbitrary coordinates is well understood, and known to require the use of a regularization scheme, in this article we take up an old proposal of constructing the path integral by using Riemann normal coordinates. The method assumes that curvature effects are taken care of by a scalar effective potential, so that the particle lagrangian is reduced to that of a…
We propose a generalisation of the $T \bar{T}$ deformation to curved spaces by defining, and solving, a suitable flow equation for the partition function. We provide evidence it is well-defined at the quantum level. This proposal identifies, for any CFT, the $T \bar{T}$ deformed partition function and a certain wavefunction of 3d quantum gravity. This connection, true for any $c$, is not a holographic duality --- the 3d theory is a "fake bulk." We however emphasise that this reduces to the known holographic connection in the classical limit. Concretely, this means the deformed partition functi…
We consider the problem of coupling Galilean-invariant quantum field theories to a fixed spacetime. We propose that to do so, one couples to Newton-Cartan geometry and in addition imposes a one-form shift symmetry. This additional symmetry imposes invariance under Galilean boosts, and its Ward identity equates particle number and momentum currents. We show that Newton-Cartan geometry subject to the shift symmetry arises in null reductions of Lorentzian manifolds, and so our proposal is realized for theories which are holographically dual to quantum gravity on Schrödinger spacetimes. We use thi…
We demonstrate that the ambiguity of the particle content for quantum fields in a generally curved space-time can be experimentally investigated in an ultracold gas of atoms forming a Bose-Einstein condensate. We explicitly evaluate the response of a suitable condensed matter detector, an ``Atomic Quantum Dot,'' which can be tuned to measure time intervals associated to different effective acoustic space-times. It is found that the detector response related to laboratory, ``adiabatic,'' and de Sitter time intervals is finite in time and nonstationary, vanishing, and thermal, respectively.
We consider relativistic quantum field theory in the presence of an external electric potential in a general curved space-time geometry. We utilise Fermi coordinates adapted to the time-like geodesic to describe the low-energy physics in the laboratory and calculate the leading correction due to the curvature of the space-time geometry to the Schrödinger equation. We then compute the non-vanishing probability of excitation for a hydrogen atom that falls in or is scattered by a general Schwarzschild black hole. The photon that is emitted from the excited state by spontaneous emission extracts e…
The $Λ$-term in Einstein's equations is a fundamental building block of the `concordance' $Λ$CDM model of cosmology. Even though the model is not free of fundamental problems, they have not been circumvented by any alternative dark energy proposal either. Here we stick to the $Λ$-term, but we contend that it can be a `running quantity' in quantum field theory (QFT) in curved spacetime. A plethora of phenomenological works have shown that this option can be highly competitive with the $Λ$CDM with a rigid cosmological term. The, so-called, `running vacuum models' (RVM's) are characterized by the…
The very early universe is understood in terms of quantum field theories on curved spacetime, where the classical background spacetime is typically an FLRW cosmology and the quantum fields which propagate on it include gravitational waves and energy density fluctuations. Many open questions seem to relate to the fact that we very little understand this regime, where part of the gravitational degrees of freedom, and only part of them, are quantized. In this work we study this limit by assigning quantum properties both to the background universe and the fluctuations and then focusing on the limi…
We provide a proposal, motivated by Separation of Variables and gauge theory arguments, for constructing exact solutions to the quantum Baxter equation associated to the $N$-particle relativistic Toda chain and test our proposal against numerical results. Quantum Mechanical non-perturbative corrections, essential in order to obtain a sensible solution, are taken into account in our gauge theory approach by considering codimension two defects on curved backgrounds (squashed $S^5$ and degenerate limits) rather than flat space; this setting also naturally incorporates exact quantization condition…
Attempts to formulate a quantum theory of gravitation are collectively known as {\it quantum gravity}. Various approaches to quantum gravity such as string theory and loop quantum gravity, as well as black hole physics and doubly special relativity theories predict a minimum measurable length, or a maximum observable momentum, and related modifications of the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle to a so-called generalized uncertainty principle (GUP). We have proposed a GUP consistent with string theory, black hole physics and doubly special relativity theories and have showed that this modifies al…
The incompressible Navier-Stokes (NS) equation is known to govern the hydrodynamic limit of essentially any fluid and its rich non-linear structure has critical implications in both mathematics and physics. The employability of the methods of Riemannian geometry to the study of hydrodynamical flows has been previously explored from a purely mathematical perspective. In this work, we propose a bulk metric in $(p+2)$-dimensions with the construction being such that the induced metric is flat on a timelike $r = r_c$ (constant) slice. We then show that the equations of {\it parallel transport} for…
