arXiv subjects

Etera R. Livine

Publications and source records attributed to Etera R. Livine.

At least 55 records · Page 3Linked to original sources

arXiv2019

Cosmology as a CFT$_1$

We show that the simplest FLRW cosmological system consisting in the homogeneous and isotropic massless Einstein-Scalar system enjoys a hidden conformal symmetry under the 1D conformal group $SL(2,\mathbb{R})$ acting as Mobius transformations in proper time. This invariance is made explicit through the mapping of FLRW cosmology onto conformal mechanics. On the one hand, we identify the corresponding conformal Noether charges, as combinations of the Hamiltonian scalar constraint, the extrinsic curvature and the 3D volume, which form a closed $sl(2,\mathbb{R})$ Lie algebra. On the other hand, this approach allows to write FLRW cosmology in terms of a AdS${}_{2}$ phase space and a Schwarzian action. Preserving this conformal structure at the quantum level fixes the ordering ambiguities in the Wheeler-de Witt quantization and allows to formulate FLRW quantum cosmology as a CFT${}_{1}$. We show that the CFT two-points correlator is realized as the overlap of the evolution in proper time of cosmological coherent wave-packets. In particular, the two-points function is built from a vacuum state which, although not conformally invariant, coincides with the cosmological vacuum annihilated by the scalar constraint. These results suggest new perspectives in classical and quantum cosmology, among which the possibility to apply the conformal bootstrap program to quantize cosmological backgrounds.

gr-qc↗

arXiv2019

Protected $SL(2,\mathbb{R})$ Symmetry in Quantum Cosmology

The polymer quantization of cosmological backgrounds provides an alternative path to the original Wheeler-de Witt (WdW) quantum cosmology, based on a different representation the commutation relations of the canonical variables. This polymer representation allows to capture the lattice like structure of the quantum geometry and leads to a radically different quantum cosmology compared to the WdW construction. This new quantization scheme has attracted considerable attention due to the singularity resolution it allows in a wide class of symmetry reduced gravitational systems, in particular where the WdW scheme fails. However, as any canonical quantization scheme, ambiguities in the construction of the quantum theory, being regularization or factor-ordering ones, can drastically modify the resulting quantum dynamics. In this work, we propose a new criteria to restrict the quantization ambiguities in the simplest model of polymer quantum cosmology, for homogeneous and isotropic General Relativity minimally coupled to a massless scalar field. This new criteria is based on an underlying $\mathfrak{sl}(2,\mathbb{R})$ structure present in the phase space of this simple cosmological model. By preserving the symmetry of this cosmological system under this 1d conformal group, we derive a new regularization of the phase space. We perform both its polymer quantization and a quantization scheme directly providing a representation of the SL$(2,\mathbb{R})$ group action. The resulting quantum cosmology can be viewed as a lattice-like quantum mechanics with an SL$(2,\mathbb{R})$ invariance. This provides a new version of Loop Quantum Cosmology consistent with the conformal symmetry. This alternative construction opens new directions, among which a possible mapping with the conformal quantum mechanics as well as with recent matrix or tensor models constructions for quantum cosmological space-time.

gr-qc↗

arXiv2019

$q$-deformed 3D Loop Gravity on the Torus

The $q$-deformed loop gravity framework was introduced as a canonical formalism for the Turaev-Viro model (with $Λ< 0$), allowing to quantize 3D Euclidean gravity with a (negative) cosmological constant using a quantum deformation of the gauge group. We describe its application to the 2-torus, explicitly writing the $q$-deformed gauge symmetries and deriving the reduced physical phase space of Dirac observables, which leads back to the Goldman brackets for the moduli space of flat connections. Furthermore it turns out that the $q$-deformed loop gravity can be derived through a gauge fixing from the Fock-Rosly bracket, which provides an explicit link between loop quantum gravity (for $q$ real) and the combinatorial quantization of 3d gravity as a Chern-Simons theory with non-vanishing cosmological constant $Λ<0$. A side-product is the reformulation of the loop quantum gravity phase space for vanishing cosmological constant $Λ=0$, based on $\mathrm{SU}(2)$ holonomies and $\mathfrak{su}(2)$ fluxes, in terms of $\mathrm{ISU}(2)$ Poincaré holonomies. Although we focus on the case of the torus as an example, our results outline the general equivalence between 3D $q$-deformed loop quantum gravity and the combinatorial quantization of Chern-Simons theory for arbitrary graph and topology.

hep-th↗

arXiv2019

Polymer Quantum Cosmology: Lifting quantization ambiguities using a $SL(2,\mathbb{R})$ conformal symmetry

In this letter, we stress that the simplest cosmological model consisting in a massless scalar field minimally coupled to homogeneous and isotropic gravity has an in-built $\SL(2,\mathbb{R})$ symmetry. Protecting this symmetry naturally provides an efficient way to constrain the quantization of this cosmological system whatever the quantization scheme and allows in particular to fix the quantization ambiguities arising in the canonical quantization program. Applying this method to the loop quantization of the FLRW cosmology leads to a new loop quantum cosmology model which preserves the $\SL(2,\mathbb{R})$ symmetry of the classical system. This new polymer regularization consistent with the conformal symmetry can be derived as a non-linear canonical transformation of the classical FLRW phase space, which maps the classical singular dynamics into a regular effective bouncing dynamics. This improved regularization preserves the scaling properties of the volume and Hamiltonian constraint. 3d scale transformations, generated by the dilatation operator, are realized as unitary transformations despite the minimal length scale hardcoded in the theory. Finally, we point out that the resulting cosmological dynamics exhibits an interesting duality between short and long distances, reminiscent of the T-duality in string theory, with the near-singularity regime dual to the semi-classical regime at large volume. The technical details of the construction of this model are presented in a longer companion paper \cite{BenAchour:2019ywl}.

gr-qc↗

arXiv2019

Gravitational edge modes: From Kac-Moody charges to Poincaré networks

We revisit the canonical framework for general relativity in its connection-vierbein formulation, recasting the Gauss law, the Bianchi identity and the space diffeomorphism bulk constraints as conservation laws for boundary surface charges, respectively electric, magnetic and momentum charges. Partitioning the space manifold into 3D regions glued together through their interfaces, we focus on a single domain and its punctured 2D boundary. The punctures carry a ladder of Kac-Moody edge modes, whose 0-modes represent the electric and momentum charges while the higher modes describe the stringy vibration modes of the 1D-boundary around each puncture. In particular, this allows to identify missing observables in the discretization scheme used in loop quantum gravity and leads to an enhanced theory upgrading spin networks to tube networks carrying Virasoro representations. In the limit where the tubes are contracted to 1D links and the string modes neglected, we do not just recover loop quantum gravity but obtain a more general structure: Poincaré charge networks, which carry a representation of the 3D diffeomorphism boundary charges on top of the $\mathrm{SU}(2)$ fluxes and gauge transformations.

hep-th↗

arXiv2019

Self-duality of the 6j-symbol and Fisher zeros for the Tetrahedron

The relation between the 2d Ising partition function and spin network evaluations, reflecting a bulk-boundary duality between the 2d Ising model and 3d quantum gravity, promises an exchange of results and methods between statistical physics and quantum geometry. We apply this relation to the case of the tetrahedral graph. First, we find that the high/low temperature duality of the 2d Ising model translates into a new self-duality formula for Wigner's 6j-symbol from the theory of spin recoupling. Second, we focus on the duality between the large spin asymptotics of the 6j-symbol and Fisher zeros. Using the Ponzano-Regge formula for the asymptotics for the 6j-symbol at large spins in terms of the tetrahedron geometry, we obtain a geometric formula for the zeros of the (inhomogeneous) Ising partition function in terms of triangle angles and dihedral angles in the tetrahedron. While it is well-known that the 2d intrinsic geometry can be used to parametrize the critical point of the Ising model, e.g. on isoradial graphs, it is the first time to our knowledge that the extrinsic geometry is found to also be relevant.This outlines a method towards a more general geometric parametrization of the Fisher zeros for the 2d Ising model on arbitrary graphs.

math-ph↗

arXiv2019

Bubble Networks: Framed Discrete Geometry for Quantum Gravity

In the context of canonical quantum gravity in 3+1 dimensions, we introduce a new notion of bubble network that represents discrete 3d space geometries. These are natural extensions of twisted geometries, which represent the geometrical data underlying loop quantum geometry and are defined as networks of SU(2) holonomies. In addition to the SU(2) representations encoding the geometrical flux, the bubble network links carry a compatible SL(2,R) representation encoding the discretized frame field which composes the flux. In contrast with twisted geometries, this extra data allows to reconstruct the frame compatible with the flux unambiguously. At the classical level this data represents a network of 3d geometrical cells glued together. The SL(2,R) data contains information about the discretized 2d metrics of the interfaces between 3d cells and SL(2,R) local transformations are understood as the group of area-preserving diffeomorphisms. We further show that the natural gluing condition with respect to this extended group structure ensures that the intrinsic 2d geometry of a boundary surface is the same from the viewpoint of the two cells sharing it. At the quantum level this gluing corresponds to a maximal entanglement along the network edges. We emphasize that the nature of this extension of twisted geometries is compatible with the general analysis of gauge theories that predicts edge mode degrees of freedom at the interface of subsystems.

gr-qc↗

arXiv2019

Area Propagator and Boosted Spin Networks in Loop Quantum Gravity

Quantum states of geometry in loop quantum gravity are defined as spin networks, which are graph dressed with SU(2) representations. A spin network edge carries a half-integer spin, representing basic quanta of area, and the standard framework imposes an area matching constraint along the edge: it carries the same spin at its source and target vertices. In the context of coarse-graining, or equivalently of the definition of spin networks as projective limits of graphs, it appears natural to introduce excitations of curvature along the edges. An edge is then treated similarly to a propagator living on the links of Feynman diagrams in quantum field theory: curvature excitations create little loops -- tadpoles -- which renormalize it. This relaxes the area matching condition, with different spins at both ends of the edge. We show that this is equivalent to combining the usual SU(2) holonomy along the edge with a Lorentz boost into SL(2,C) group elements living on the spin network edges, underlining the fact that the Ashtekar-Barbero connection carries extrinsic curvature degrees of freedom. This finally leads us to introduce a new notion of area waves in loop quantum gravity.

gr-qc↗

arXiv2018

Deformations of Lorentzian Polyhedra: Kapovich-Millson phase space and SU(1,1) Intertwiners

We describe the Lorentzian version of the Kapovitch-Millson phase space for polyhedra with $N$ faces. Starting with the Schwinger representation of the $\mathfrak{su}(1,1)$ Lie algebra in terms of a pair of complex variables (or spinor), we define the phase space for a space-like vectors in the three-dimensional Minkowski space $\mathbb{R}^{1,2}$. Considering $N$ copies of this space, quotiented by a closure constraint forcing the sum of those 3-vectors to vanish, we obtain the phase space for Lorentzian polyhedra with $N$ faces whose normal vectors are space-like, up to Lorentz transformations. We identify a generating set of $SU(1,1)$-invariant observables, whose flow by the Poisson bracket generate both area-preserving and area-changing deformations. We further show that the area-preserving observables form a $\mathfrak{gl}_{N}(\mathbb{R})$ Lie algebra and that they generate a $GL_{N}(\mathbb{R})$ action on Lorentzian polyhedra at fixed total area. That action is cyclic and all Lorentzian polyhedra can be obtained from a totally squashed polyhedron (with only two non-trivial faces) by a $GL_{N}(\mathbb{R})$ transformation. All those features carry on to the quantum level, where quantum Lorentzian polyhedra are defined as $SU(1,1)$ intertwiners between unitary $SU(1,1)$-representations from the principal continuous series. Those $SU(1,1)$-intertwiners are the building blocks of spin network states in loop quantum gravity in 3+1 dimensions for time-like slicing and the present analysis applies to deformations of the quantum geometry of time-like boundaries in quantum gravity, which is especially relevant to the study of quasi-local observables and holographic duality.

math-ph↗

arXiv2018

From Coarse-Graining to Holography in Loop Quantum Gravity

We discuss the relation between coarse-graining and the holographic principle in the framework of loop quantum gravity and ask the following question: when we coarse-grain arbitrary spin network states of quantum geometry, are we integrating out physical degrees of freedom or gauge degrees of freedom? Focusing on how bulk spin network states for bounded regions of space are projected onto boundary states, we show that all possible boundary states can be recovered from bulk spin networks with a single vertex in the bulk and a single internal loop attached to it. This partial reconstruction of the bulk from the boundary leads us to the idea of realizing the Hamiltonian constraints at the quantum level as a gauge equivalence reducing arbitrary spin network states to one-loop bulk states. This proposal of "dynamics through coarse-graining" would lead to a one-to-one map between equivalence classes of physical states under gauge transformations and boundary states, thus defining holographic dynamics for loop quantum gravity.

gr-qc↗

arXiv2018

Probing the Shape of Quantum Surfaces: the Quadrupole Moment Operator

The standard toolkit of operators to probe quanta of geometry in loop quantum gravity consists in area and volume operators as well as holonomy operators. New operators have been defined, in the U(N) framework for intertwiners, which allow to explore the finer structure of quanta of geometry. However these operators do not carry information on the global shape of the intertwiners. Here we introduce dual multipole moments for continuous and discrete surfaces, defined through the normal vector to the surface, taking special care to maintain parametrization invariance. These are raised to multipole operators probing the shape of quantum surfaces. Further focusing on the quadrupole moment, we show that it appears as the Hessian matrix of the large spin Gaussian approximation of coherent intertwiners, which is the standard method for extracting the semi-classical regime of spinfoam transition amplitudes. This offers an improvement on the usual loop quantum gravity techniques, which mostly focus on the volume operator, in the perspective of modeling (quantum) gravitational waves as shape fluctuations waves propagating on spin network states.

gr-qc↗

arXiv2018

Quasi-local holographic dualities in non-perturbative 3d quantum gravity

We present a line of research aimed at investigating holographic dualities in the context of three dimensional quantum gravity within finite bounded regions. The bulk quantum geometrodynamics is provided by the Ponzano-Regge state-sum model, which defines 3d quantum gravity as a discrete topological quantum field theory (TQFT). This formulation provides an explicit and detailed definition of the quantum boundary states, which allows a rich correspondence between quantum boundary conditions and boundary theories, thereby leading to holographic dualities between 3d quantum gravity and 2d statistical models as used in condensed matter. After presenting the general framework, we focus on the concrete example of the coherent twisted torus boundary, which allows for a direct comparison with other approaches to 3d/2d holography at asymptotic infinity. We conclude with the most interesting questions to pursue in this framework.

hep-th↗

arXiv2017

Entanglement entropy and correlations in loop quantum gravity

Black hole entropy is one of the few windows toward the quantum aspects of gravitation and its study over the years have highlighted the holographic nature of gravity. At the non-perturbative level in quantum gravity, promising explanations are being explored in terms of the entanglement entropy between regions of space. In the context of loop quantum gravity, this translates into the analysis of the correlations between regions of the spin network states defining the quantum state of geometry of space. In this paper, we explore a class of states, motivated by results in condensed matter physics, satisfying an area law for entanglement entropy and having non-trivial correlations. We highlight that entanglement comes from holonomy operators acting on loops crossing the boundary of the region.

gr-qc↗

arXiv2017

Intertwiner Entanglement on Spin Networks

In the context of quantum gravity, we clarify entanglement calculations on spin networks: we distinguish the gauge-invariant entanglement between intertwiners located at the nodes and the entanglement between spin states located on the network's links. We compute explicitly these two notions of entanglement between neighboring nodes and show that they are always related to the typical $\ln(2j+1)$ term depending on the spin $j$ living on the link between them. This $\ln(2j+1)$ contribution comes from looking at non-gauge invariant states, thus we interpret it as gauge-breaking and unphysical. In particular, this confirms that pure spin network basis states do not carry any physical entanglement, so that true entanglement and correlations in loop quantum gravity comes from spin or intertwiner superpositions.

gr-qc↗

arXiv2017

The Thiemann Complexifier and the CVH algebra for Classical and Quantum FLRW Cosmology

In the context of Loop Quantum Gravity (LQG), we study the fate of Thiemann complexifier in homogeneous and isotropic FRW cosmology. The complexifier is the dilatation operator acting on the canonical phase space for gravity and generates the canonical transformations shifting the Barbero-Immirzi parameter. We focus on the closed algebra consisting in the complexifier, the 3d volume and the Hamiltonian constraint, which we call the CVH algebra. In standard cosmology, for gravity coupled to a scalar field, the CVH algebra is identified as a su(1,1) Lie algebra, with the Hamiltonian as a null generator, the complexifier as a boost and the su(1,1) Casimir given by the matter density. The loop gravity cosmology approach introduces a regularization length scale $λ$ and regularizes the gravitational Hamiltonian in terms of SU(2) holonomies. We show that this regularization is compatible with the CVH algebra, if we suitably regularize the complexifier and inverse volume factor. The regularized complexifier generates a generalized version of the Barbero's canonical transformation which reduces to the classical one when $λ\rightarrow 0$. This structure allows for the exact integration of the actions of the Hamiltonian constraints and the complexifier. This straightforwardly extends to the quantum level: the cosmological evolution is described in terms of SU(1,1) coherent states and the regularized complexifier generates unitary transformations. The Barbero-Immirzi parameter is to be distinguished from the regularization scale $λ$, it can be rescaled unitarily and the Immirzi ambiguity ultimately disappears from the physical predictions of the theory. Finally, we show that the complexifier becomes the effective Hamiltonian when deparametrizing the dynamics using the scalar field as a clock, thus underlining the deep relation between cosmological evolution and scale

gr-qc↗

arXiv2017

Quantum Surface and Intertwiner Dynamics in Loop Quantum Gravity

We introduce simple generic models of surface dynamics in loop quantum gravity (LQG). A quantum surface is defined as a set of elementary patches of area glued together. We provide it with an extra structure of locality (nearest neighbors), thought of as induced by the whole spin network state defining the 3d bulk geometry around the quantum surface. Here, we focus on classical surface dynamics, using a spinorial description of surface degrees of freedom. We introduce two classes of dynamics, to be thought as templates for future investigation of LQG dynamics with in mind the dynamics of quantum black holes. The first defines global dynamics of the closure defect of the surface, with two basic toy-models, either a dissipative dynamics relaxing towards the closure constraint or a Hamiltonian dynamics precessing the closure defect. The second class of dynamics describes the isolated regime, when both area and closure defect are conserved throughout the evolution. The surface dynamics is implemented through U(N) transformations and generalizes to a Bose-Hubbard Hamiltonian with a local quadratic potential interaction. We briefly discuss the implications of modeling the quantum black hole dynamics by a surface Bose-Hubbard model.

hep-th↗

arXiv2016

3d Quantum Gravity: Coarse-Graining and q-Deformation

The Ponzano-Regge state-sum model provides a quantization of 3d gravity as a spin foam, providing a quantum amplitude to each 3d triangulation defined in terms of the 6j-symbol (from the spin-recoupling theory of SU(2) representations). In this context, the invariance of the 6j-symbol under 4-1 Pachner moves, mathematically defined by the Biedenharn-Elliot identity, can be understood as the invariance of the Ponzano-Regge model under coarse-graining or equivalently as the invariance of the amplitudes under the Hamiltonian constraints. Here we look at length and volume insertions in the Biedenharn-Elliot identity for the 6j-symbol, derived in some sense as higher derivatives of the original formula. This gives the behavior of these geometrical observables under coarse-graining. These new identities turn out to be related to the Biedenharn-Elliot identity for the q-deformed 6j-symbol and highlight that the q-deformation produces a cosmological constant term in the Hamiltonian constraints of 3d quantum gravity.

gr-qc↗

arXiv2016

The closure constraint for the hyperbolic tetrahedron as a Bianchi identity

The closure constraint is a central piece of the mathematics of loop quantum gravity. It encodes the gauge invariance of the spin network states of quantum geometry and provides them with a geometrical interpretation: each decorated vertex of a spin network is dual to a quantized polyhedron in $\mathbb{R}^{3}$. For instance, a 4-valent vertex is interpreted as a tetrahedron determined by the four normal vectors of its faces. We develop a framework where the closure constraint is re-interpreted as a Bianchi identity, with the normals defined as holonomies around the polyhedron faces of a connection (constructed from the spinning geometry interpretation of twisted geometries). This allows us to define closure constraints for hyperbolic tetrahedra (living in the 3-hyperboloid of unit future-oriented spacelike vectors in $\mathbb{R}^{3,1}$) in terms of normals living all in $SU(2)$ or in $SB(2,\mathbb{C})$. The latter fits perfectly with the classical phase space developed for $q$-deformed loop quantum gravity supposed to account for a non-vanishing cosmological constant $Λ>0$. This is the first step towards interpreting $q$-deformed twisted geometries as actual discrete hyperbolic triangulations.

gr-qc↗