arXiv subjects

Antonino Marcianò

Publications and source records attributed to Antonino Marcianò.

At least 19 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2026

White paper: 1-10 Hz matter-wave interferometer to test the spin entanglement witness for quantum gravity

In this white paper, we highlight the importance of the ($1-10~{\rm Hz}$) frequency range for laboratory tests of the quantum nature of gravity using the quantum gravity-induced entanglement of masses (QGEM) protocol. QGEM requires matter-wave interferometers with masses ($m\sim10^{-15}-10^{-14}~{\rm kg}$), brought within separations ($d\sim30-50~μ{\rm m}$), while maintaining spatial superpositions of ($1-20~μ{\rm m}$) and coherence for ($τ\sim 0.1 - 1~{\rm s}$). These requirements make low-frequency environmental noise a central experimental challenge and place QGEM in a regime closely related to the low-frequency goals of the Einstein Telescope (ET) and the Cosmic Explorer (CE). In particular, QGEM is sensitive to relative acceleration noise (RAN) and to gravity-gradient noise (GGN) generated by seismic and other environmental mass-density fluctuations. For representative parameters $m=10^{-14}~{\rm kg}$, $Δx=10~μ{\rm m}$, and $τ=1~{\rm s}$, the differential acceleration-noise amplitude spectral density must be suppressed well below the $10^{-15}~{\rm m\,s^{-2}/\sqrt{Hz}}$ level to keep acceleration-induced dephasing below the relevant experimental scale. Achieving this level of low-frequency noise suppression is therefore a key requirement for QGEM and closely parallels the seismic and gravity-gradient noise challenges that ET and CE address.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2026

Amplituhedra for generic quantum processes via the TQNN representation of UQC

We study the relationship between computation and scattering both operationally (hence phenomenologically) and formally. We develop a representation of universal quantum computation (UQC) within the formalism of topological quantum neural networks (TQNNs), using the Reshetikhin-Turaev and Turaev-Viro models to show how TQNNs implement quantum error-correcting codes. We then exhibit a formal correspondence between TQNNs and amplituhedra to support the existence of amplituhedra for representing generic quantum processes. This construction shows how amplituhedra are geometric representations of underlying topological structures. We conclude by pointing to applications areas enabled by these results.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2026

Experimental exclusion of a generalized Károlyházy gravity-induced decoherence model

We report new experimental constraints on the generalized version of the gravity-induced decoherence model originally proposed by Károlyházy. Using data collected by the VIP Collaboration at the INFN Gran Sasso National Laboratory with a high-purity germanium detector, we derive an improved lower bound on the spatial correlation length $R_K$ characterizing metric fluctuations in the model. We obtain a bound $R_K > 4.64$ m (95\% C.L.), which exceeds by more than an order of magnitude the previous experimental limit. When combined with the theoretical upper bound $R_K <1.98$ m derived from macroscopic localization requirements, our result excludes the generalized Károlyházy model. The same conclusion applies to an associated non-Markovian formulation of the Continuous Spontaneous Localization (CSL) model. Our findings significantly tighten experimental constraints on gravity-related decoherence scenarios and demonstrate the sensitivity of underground low-background experiments to foundational modifications of quantum mechanics.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2025

Operational protocols cannot certify classicality

The existence and practical utility of operational protocols that certify entanglement raises the question of whether operational protocols exist that certify the absence of entanglement, i.e. that certify separability. We show, within a purely topological, interpretation-independent representation, that such protocols do not exist. Classicality is therefore, as Bohr suggested, purely a pragmatic notion.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2025

Hamiltonian Analysis of Pre-geometric Gravity

The Einstein-Cartan theory of gravity can arise from a mechanism of spontaneous symmetry breaking within the context of pre-geometric gauge theories. In this work, we develop the Hamiltonian analysis of such theories. By making contact with the ADM formalism, we show that all the results of canonical General Relativity are correctly recovered in the IR limit of the spontaneously broken phase. We then apply Dirac's algorithm to study the algebra of constraints and determine the number of degrees of freedom in the UV limit of the unbroken phase. We also discuss possible pathways toward a UV completion of General Relativity, including a pre-geometric generalisation of the Wheeler-DeWitt equation and an extended BF formulation of the pre-geometric theory.

gr-qc↗

arXiv2023

Gravitational echoes of lepton number symmetry breaking with light and ultralight Majorons

We formulate a version of the low-scale Majoron model equipped with an inverse seesaw mechanism featuring lepton-number preserving dimension-6 operators in the scalar potential. Contrary to its dimension-4 counterpart, we find that the model can simultaneously provide light and ultralight Majorons, neutrino masses and their mixing, while featuring strong first-order cosmological phase transitions associated to the spontaneous breaking of the lepton number and the electroweak symmetries in the early Universe. We show by a detailed numerical analysis that under certain conditions on the parameter space accounted for in collider physics, the model can be probed via the primordial gravitational wave spectrum potentially observable at LISA and other planned facilities.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2022

Cosmology from Strong Interactions

The wealth of theoretical and phenomenological information about Quantum Chromodynamics at short and long distances collected so far in major collider measurements has profound implications in cosmology. We provide a brief discussion on the major implications of the strongly coupled dynamics of quarks and gluons as well as on effects due to their collective motion on the physics of the early universe and in astrophysics.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2022

Dark Energy and Neutrino Superfluids

We show that the neutrino mass, the dark matter and the dark energy can be explained in a unified framework, postulating a new invisible Born-Infeld field, which we name "non-linear dark photon", undergoing a meV-scale dynamical transmutation and coupled to neutrinos. Dark energy genesis is dynamically explained as a byproduct of the dark photon condensation, inducing the bare massless neutrinos to acquire an effective mass around the meV scale. It is fascinating to contemplate the channel induced by the non-linear dark photon leading to the pairing of the non-relativistic neutrinos, hence generating a cosmological superfluid state. As a consequence, the appearance of a light neutrino composite boson is predicted, providing a good cold dark matter candidate. In particular, if our model is enriched by an extra global Lepton number $U_L(1)$ symmetry, then the neutrino pair can be identified with a composite Majoron field with intriguing phenomenological implications for the neutrinoless-double-beta-decay ($0νββ$). Our model carries interesting phenomenological implications since dark energy, dark matter and the neutrino mass are time-varying dynamical variables, as a consequence of the non-linear Born-Infeld interaction terms. Limits arising from PLANCK+SNe+BAO collaborations data are also discussed. Finally, our model allows for an inverse hierarchy of neutrino masses, with interesting implications for the JUNO experiment.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2022

The Free Energy Principle drives neuromorphic development

We show how any system with morphological degrees of freedom and locally limited free energy will, under the constraints of the free energy principle, evolve toward a neuromorphic morphology that supports hierarchical computations in which each level of the hierarchy enacts a coarse-graining of its inputs, and dually a fine-graining of its outputs. Such hierarchies occur throughout biology, from the architectures of intracellular signal transduction pathways to the large-scale organization of perception and action cycles in the mammalian brain. Formally, the close formal connections between cone-cocone diagrams (CCCD) as models of quantum reference frames on the one hand, and between CCCDs and topological quantum field theories on the other, allow the representation of such computations in the fully-general quantum-computational framework of topological quantum neural networks.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2020

String Memories ... Lost and Regained

We discuss stringy ${α'}$ corrections to the gravitational wave signal generated in the merging of two black holes. We model the merging with two BPS compact massive objects in the heterotic string, described by standard vertex operators or coherent states. Despite the expected cubic suppression in ${α'}$ w.r.t. the General Relativity result, at tree level the string corrections seem to leave a footprint or a memory on the gravitational wave signals within the sensitivity region of aLIGO/VIRGO and future interferometers. Including loop effects that broaden and destabilise the string resonances suggests a sort of lost stringy memory effect that can be regained through the analysis of the quasi normal modes in the ring-down phase.

hep-th↗

arXiv2020

Gravitational footprints of massive neutrinos and lepton number breaking

We investigate the production of primordial Gravitational Waves (GWs) arising from First Order Phase Transitions (FOPTs) associated to neutrino mass generation in the context of type-I and inverse seesaw schemes. We examine both "high-scale" as well as "low-scale" variants, with either explicit or spontaneously broken lepton number symmetry $U(1)_L$ in the neutrino sector. In the latter case, a pseudo-Goldstone majoron-like boson may provide a candidate for cosmological dark matter. We find that schemes with softly-broken $U(1)_L$ and with single Higgs-doublet scalar sector lead to either no FOPTs or too weak FOPTs, precluding the detectability of GWs in present or near future measurements. Nevertheless, we found that, in the majoron-like seesaw scheme with spontaneously broken $U(1)_L$ at finite temperatures, one can have strong FOPTs and non-trivial primordial GW spectra which can fall well within the frequency and amplitude sensitivity of upcoming experiments, including LISA, BBO and u-DECIGO. However, GWs observability clashes with invisible Higgs decay constraints from the LHC. A simple and consistent fix is to assume the majoron-like mass to lie above the Higgs-decay kinematical threshold. We also found that the majoron-like variant of the low-scale seesaw mechanism implies a different GW spectrum than the one expected in the high-scale seesaw. This feature will be testable in future experiments. Our analysis shows that GWs can provide a new and complementary portal to test the neutrino mass generation mechanism.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2019

Sharing nonfungible information requires shared nonfungible information

We show that sharing a quantum reference frame requires sharing measurement operators that identify the reference frame in addition to operators that measure its state. Observers restricted to finite resources cannot, in general, operationally determine that they share such operators. Uncertainty about whether system-identification operators are shared induces decoherence.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2019

Mirror Symmetry of quantum Yang-Mills vacua and cosmological implications

We find an argument related to the existence of a Z_2-symmetry for the renormalization group flow derived from the bare Yang-Mills Lagrangian, and show that the cancellation of the vacuum energy may arise motivated both from the renormalization group flow solutions and the effective Yang-Mills action. In the framework of the effective Savvidy's action, two Mirror minima are allowed, with exactly equal and hold opposite sign energy densities. At the cosmological level, we explore the stability of the electric and magnetic attractor solutions, both within and beyond the perturbation theory, and find that thanks to these latter the cancellation between the electric and the magnetic vacua components is achieved at macroscopic space and time separations. This implies the disappearance of the conformal anomaly in the classical limit of an effective Yang-Mills theory. In this picture, the tunneling probability from the Mirror vacua to the other vacua is exponentially suppressed in the quantum non-thermal state --- similarly to what happens for electroweak instantonic tunneling solutions. Specifically, we show that, in a dynamical Friedmann-Lemaître-Robertson-Walker (FLRW) cosmological background, the Nielsen-Olsen argument --- on the instability of uniform chromo-electric and chromo-magnetic Mirror vacua --- is subtly violated. The chromo-magnetic and chromo-electric uniform vacua are unstable only at asymptotic times, when the attractor to a zero energy density is already reached. The two vacua can safely decay into one anisotropic vacuum that has zero energy-density. We also discover a new surprising pattern of solitonic and anti-solitonic space-like solutions, which are sourced by the Yang-Mills dynamics in FLRW. We dub such non-perturbative configurations, which are directly related to dynamical cancellation mechanism of the vacuum energy, as {\it chronons}, or $χ$-solutions.

hep-th↗

arXiv2018

Quantum coordinate operators: why space-time lattice is fuzzy

Working within the framework of Loop Quantum Gravity (LQG), we construct a set of three operators suitable for identifying coordinate-like quantities on a spin-network configuration. In doing so, we rely on known properties of operators for angles, which are already well-known in the LQG literature. These operators are defined on the kinematical Hilbert space, in a background-independent fashion. Computing their action on coherent states, we are able to study some relevant properties such us the spectra, which are discrete. In particular, we focus on the algebra generated by quantum coordinates and, remarkably, it turns out that they do not commute. Interestingly, this may provide additional hints on how space-time noncommutativity could be realized in the context of LQG. The semiclassical regime, necessary to make contact with coordinates on manifolds, is also explored and, specifically, is given by the large-spin limit in which commutativity can be restored. Finally, building on well-established results, we discuss how it is possible to have regularization.

hep-th↗

arXiv2017

Klein-Gordon field from the XXZ Heisenberg model

We examine the recently introduced idea of Spin-Field Correspondence focusing on the example of the spin system described by the XXZ Heisenberg model with external magnetic field. The Hamiltonian of the resulting nonlinear scalar field theory is derived for arbitrary value of the anisotropy parameter $Δ$. We show that the linear scalar field theory is reconstructed in the large spin limit. For $Δ=1$ a non-relativistic scalar field theory satisfying the Born reciprocity principle is recovered. As expected, for the vanishing anisotropy parameter $Δ\rightarrow 0$ the standard relativistic Klein-Gordon field is obtained. Various aspects of the obtained class of the scalar fields are studied, including the fate of the relativistic symmetries and the properties of the emerging interaction terms. We show that, in a certain limit, the so-called polymer quantisation of the field variables is recovered. This and other discussed properties suggest a possible relevance of the considered framework in the context of quantum gravity.

hep-th↗

arXiv2016

Dark Energy and Dark Matter from Yang-Mills Condensate and the Peccei-Quinn mechanism

We analyze a model of cold axion Dark Matter weakly coupled with a dark gluon condensate, reproducing Dark Energy. We first review how to recover the Dark Energy behavior using the functional renormalization group approach, and ground our study on the properties of the effective Lagrangian, to be determined non-perturbatively. Then, within the context of $G_{SM}\times SU(2)_{D}\times U(1)_{PQ}$, we consider YMC interactions with QCD axions. We predict a transfer of Dark Energy density into Dark Matter density in a cosmological time that can be tested in the next generation of experiments dedicated to Dark Energy measures.

gr-qc↗

arXiv2016

Invisible QCD as Dark Energy

We account for the late time acceleration of the Universe by extending the QCD color to a $SU(3)$ invisible sector (IQCD). If the Invisible Chiral symmetry is broken in the early universe, a condensate of dark pions (dpions) and dark gluons (dgluons) forms. The condensate naturally forms due to strong dynamics similar to the Nambu--Jona-Lasinio mechanism. As the Universe evolves from early times to present times the interaction energy between the dgluon and dpion condensate dominates with a negative pressure equation of state and causes late time acceleration. We conclude with a stability analysis of the coupled perturbations of the dark pions and dark gluons.

hep-th↗

arXiv2015

Non-Perturbative Yang-Mills Condensate as Dark Energy

Models based on Yang-Mills condensate (YMC) have been advocated in the literature and claimed to be successful candidates to explain dark energy. Several instantiations of this simple idea have been considered, the most promising of which are reviewed here. Nevertheless, results previously attained heavily relied on the perturbative approach to the analysis of the effective Yang-Mills action, which is only adequate in the asymptotically-free limit, and were extended into a regime, the infrared limit, in which confinement is expected. We show that if a minimum of the effective Lagrangian in $θ\!=\! - F_{\, \, μν}^a \, F^{a μν}/2$ exists, a YMC forms that drives the Universe toward an accelerated de Sitter phase. The details of the models depend weakly on the specific form of the effective Yang-Mills Lagrangian. Using non-perturbative techniques mutated from the functional renormalization group procedure, we finally show that the minimum in $θ$ of the effective Lagrangian exists, thus YMC can actually take place. The non-perturbative model has properties similar to the ones of the perturbative model. In the early stage of the universe, the YMC equation of state has an evolution that resembles the radiation component, i.e. $w_y \rightarrow 1/3$. However, in the late stage, $w_y$ naturally runs to the critical state with $w_y =-1$, and the universe transits from matter-dominated into dark energy dominated stage only recently, at a redshift the value of which depends on the initial conditions that are chosen while solving the dynamical system.

gr-qc↗