Quantum gravity and the cosmological constant: lessons from two-dimensional dilaton gravity
arXiv:1212.4538 · doi:10.1103/PhysRevD.87.084016
Abstract
In the investigation and resolution of the cosmological constant problem the inclusion of the dynamics of quantum gravity can be a crucial step. In this work we suggest that the quantum constraints in a canonical theory of gravity can provide a way of addressing the issue: we consider the case of two-dimensional quantum dilaton gravity non-minimally coupled to a U(1) gauge field, in the presence of an arbitrary number of massless scalar matter fields, intended also as an effective description of highly symmetrical higher-dimensional models. We are able to quantize the system non-perturbatively and obtain an expression for the cosmological constant Λin terms of the quantum physical states, in a generalization of the usual QFT approach. We discuss the role of the classical and quantum gravitational contributions to Λand present a partial spectrum of values for it.
arXiv comment20 pages, 1 figure
References in corpus (12)
- Observational Evidence from Supernovae for an Accelerating Universe and a Cosmological Constant
- Measurements of Omega and Lambda from 42 High-Redshift Supernovae
- The Cosmological Constant
- Evanescent Black Holes
- Dilaton Gravity in Two Dimensions
- Liouville Field Theory -- A decade after the revolution
- Thermodynamics of Black Holes in Two (and Higher) Dimensions
- The Cosmological Constant Problem, Dark Energy, and the Landscape of String Theory
- Ramifications of Lineland
- Quantized cosmological constant in 1+1 dimensional quantum gravity with coupled scalar matter
- Duality between 1+1 dimensional Maxwell-Dilaton gravity and Liouville field theory
- Two-dimensional quantum dilaton gravity and the quantized cosmological constant