arXiv subjects
Publications and source records attributed to Joshua Erlich.
In this essay I describe some new results of a framework for composite gravity coupled to matter. These include the Bekenstein-Hawking entropy formula, modifications to the low-$\ell$ moments of the CMB power spectrum, and new perspectives on the Hartle-Hawking no-boundary proposal and the initial conditions for inflation. We conclude with suggestions for experimental tests of the framework.
Observations of velocity dispersions of galactic structures over a wide range of scales point to the existence of a universal acceleration scale $a_0\sim 10^{-10}$ m/s$^2$. Focusing on the fuzzy dark matter paradigm, which proposes ultralight dark matter with mass around $10^{-22}$ eV and de Broglie wavelength $\lambda\sim {\rm few}\times10^{2}$ parsecs, we highlight the emergence of the observed acceleration scale from quantum effects in a fluid-like description of the dark matter dynamics. We then suggest the possibility of a natural connection between the acceleration scale and dark energy within the same paradigm.
We present a first analysis of a nonperturbative approach to quantum gravity based on a representation of quantum field theory in terms of stochastic processes. The stochastic description accommodates a physical Lorentz-invariant ultraviolet regulator that provides a novel description of physics at ultra-short distances. In a stochastic composite gravity model we demonstrate the evolution of a generic initial field configuration towards an equilibrium in which the composite spacetime metric fluctuates about a flat spacetime. We argue that fluctuations about the vacuum give rise to an emergent gravitational interaction consistent with Einstein gravity at long distances. We uncover a formal similarity between regularization by stochastic discreteness and point-splitting regularization in the corresponding quantum field theory. We comment on the signature of the emergent spacetime, possible consequences for the early universe, and the potential for observational and experimental tests of the stochastic origin of quantum field theory and gravitation.
We explore a background-independent theory of composite gravity. The vacuum expectation value of the composite metric satisfies Einstein's equations (with corrections) as a consistency condition, and selects the vacuum spacetime. A gravitational interaction then emerges in vacuum correlation functions. The action remains diffeomorphism invariant even as perturbation theory is organized about the dynamically selected vacuum spacetime. We discuss the role of nondynamical clock and rod fields in the analysis, the identification of physical observables, and the generalization to other theories including the standard model.
We present a metric-independent, diffeomorphism-invariant model with interacting fermions that contains a massless composite graviton in its spectrum. The model is motivated by the supersymmetric D-brane action, modulated by a fermion potential. The gravitational coupling is related to new physics at the cutoff scale that regularizes UV divergences. We also speculate on possible extensions of the model.
We present a stochastic framework for emergent quantum gravity coupled to matter. The Hamiltonian constraint in diffeomorphism-invariant theories demands the identification of a clock relative to which dynamics may be defined, and other degrees of freedom can play the role of rulers. However, a global system of clock and rulers is generally not available. We provide evidence that stochasticity associated with critical points of clock and ruler fields can be related to the emergence of both a probabilistic description consistent with ordinary quantum theory, and gravitation described by general relativity at long distances. We propose a procedure for embedding any Lorentz-invariant field theory, including the Standard Model and its Lorentz-invariant extensions, in this framework.
Field theories that are generally covariant but nongravitational at tree level typically give rise to an emergent gravitational interaction whose strength depends on a physical regulator. We consider emergent gravity models in which scalar fields assume the role of clock and rulers, addressing the problem of time in quantum gravity. We discuss the possibility of nontrivial dynamics for clock and ruler fields, and describe some of the consequences of those dynamics for the emergent gravitational theory.
A constraint of vanishing energy-momentum tensor is motivated by a variety of perspectives on quantum gravity. We demonstrate in a concrete example how this constraint leads to a metric-independent theory in which quantum gravity emerges as a nonperturbative artifact of regularization-scale physics. We analyze a scalar theory similar to the Dirac-Born-Infeld (DBI) theory with vanishing gauge fields, with the DBI Lagrangian modulated by a scalar potential. In the limit of a large number of scalars, we explicitly demonstrate the existence of a composite massless spin-2 graviton in the spectrum that couples to matter as in Einstein gravity. We comment on the cosmological constant problem and the generalization to theories with fermions and gauge fields.
Multi-field inflation models include a variety of scenarios for how inflation proceeds and ends. Models with the same potential but different kinetic terms are common in the literature. We compare spiral inflation and Dante's inferno-type models, which differ only in their field-space metric. We justify a single-field effective description in these models and relate the single-field description to a mass-matrix formalism. We note the effects of the nontrivial field-space metric on inflationary observables, and consequently on the viability of these models. We also note a duality between spiral inflation and Dante's inferno models with different potentials.
We describe a hybrid axion-monodromy inflation model motivated by the Dante's Inferno scenario. In Dante's Inferno, a two-field potential features a stable trench along which a linear combination of the two fields slowly rolls, rendering the dynamics essentially identical to that of single-field chaotic inflation. A shift symmetry allows for the Lyth bound to be effectively evaded as in other axion-monodromy models. In our proposal, the potential is concave downward near the origin and the inflaton trajectory is a gradual downward spiral, ending at a point where the trench becomes unstable. There, the fields begin falling rapidly towards the minimum of the potential and inflation terminates as in a hybrid model. We find parameter choices that reproduce observed features of the cosmic microwave background, and discuss our model in light of recent results from the BICEP2 and Planck experiments.
In this report we explore the remarkable connections between light-front dynamics, its holographic mapping to gravity in a higher-dimensional anti-de Sitter (AdS) space, and conformal quantum mechanics. This approach provides new insights into the origin of a fundamental mass scale and the physics underlying confinement dynamics in QCD in the limit of massless quarks. The result is a relativistic light-front wave equation for arbitrary spin with an effective confinement potential derived from a conformal action and its embedding in AdS space. This equation allows for the computation of essential features of hadron spectra in terms of a single scale. The light-front holographic methods described here gives a precise interpretation of holographic variables and quantities in AdS in terms of light-front variables and quantum numbers. This leads to a relation between the AdS wave functions and the boost-invariant light-front wave functions describing the internal structure of hadronic bound states in physical space-time. The pion is massless in the chiral limit and the excitation spectra of relativistic light-quark meson and baryon bound states lie on linear Regge trajectories with identical slopes in the radial and orbital quantum numbers. In the light-front holographic approach described here currents are expressed as an infinite sum of poles, and form factors as a product of poles. At large $q^2$ the form factor incorporates the correct power-law fall-off for hard scattering independent of the specific dynamics and is dictated by the twist. At low $q^2$ the form factor leads to vector dominance. The approach is also extended to include small quark masses. We briefly review in this report other holographic approaches to QCD, in particular top-down and bottom-up models based on chiral symmetry breaking. We also include a discussion of open problems and future applications.
We analyze a model of hybrid natural inflation based on the smallest non-Abelian discrete group S_3. Leading invariant terms in the scalar potential have an accidental global symmetry that is spontaneously broken, providing a pseudo-Goldstone boson that is identified as the inflaton. The S_3 symmetry restricts both the form of the inflaton potential and the couplings of the inflaton field to the waterfall fields responsible for the end of inflation. We identify viable points in the model parameter space. Although the power in tensor modes is small in most of the parameter space of the model, we identify parameter choices that yield potentially observable values of r without super-Planckian initial values of the inflaton field.
Holographic QCD is an extra-dimensional approach to modeling hadrons, the bound states of the strong interactions. In holographic models, the extra spatial dimension creates a waveguide for fields, and the discrete towers of modes propagating in that waveguide are interpreted as hadronic resonances. These models are motivated by the AdS/CFT correspondence, which is a duality that relates theories in different numbers of spatial dimensions. Holographic models have the potential to provide a better understanding of strongly interacting systems of quarks and gluons, as well as unconventional superconductors and other nonperturbative systems.
Holographic models of superconductors successfully reproduce certain experimental features of high-temperature superconductors, such as a large gap-to-T_c ratio compared to that of conventional superconductors. By deconstructing the extra dimension of these holographic models, similar phenomenology is described by a class of models defined in the natural dimension of the superconducting system. We analyze the sensitivity of certain observables in holographic and deconstructed holographic superconductors to details of the extra-dimensional spacetime. Our results support the notion that certain quantitative successes of simple models of this type are accidental. However, we also find a certain universal relationship between superconducting observables.
We present a dimensionally deconstructed model of an s-wave holographic superconductor. The 2+1 dimensional model includes multiple charged Cooper pair fields and neutral exciton fields that have interactions governed by hidden local symmetries. We derive AdS/CFT-like relations for the current and charge density in the model, and we analyze properties of the Cooper pair condensates and the complex conductivity.
In a hard-wall model of holographic QCD, we find that nonlinear boundary dynamics are required in order to maintain the correct pattern of explicit and spontaneous chiral symmetry breaking beyond leading order in the pion fields. With the help of a field redefinition, we relate the requisite nonlinear boundary conditions to a standard Sturm-Liouville system. Observables insensitive to the chiral limit receive only small corrections in the improved description, and classical calculations in the hard-wall model remain surprisingly accurate.
We construct an explicit, TeV-scale model of decaying dark matter in which the approximate stability of the dark matter candidate is a consequence of a global symmetry that is broken only by instanton-induced operators generated by a non-Abelian dark gauge group. The dominant dark matter decay channels are to standard model leptons. Annihilation of the dark matter to standard model states occurs primarily through the Higgs portal. We show that the mass and lifetime of the dark matter candidate in this model can be chosen to be consistent with the values favored by fits to data from the PAMELA and Fermi LAT experiments.
We study pion condensation at zero temperature in a hard-wall holographic model of hadrons with isospin chemical potential. We find that the transition from the hadronic phase to the pion condensate phase is first order except in a certain limit of model parameters. Our analysis suggests that immediately across the phase boundary the condensate acts as a stiff medium approaching the Zel'dovich limit of equal energy density and pressure.