Unitary Equivalence of the Metric and Holonomy Formulations of 2+1 Dimensional Quantum Gravity on the Torus

Abstract

Recent work on canonical transformations in quantum mechanics is applied to transform between the Moncrief metric formulation and the Witten-Carlip holonomy formulation of 2+1-dimensional quantum gravity on the torus. A non-polynomial factor ordering of the classical canonical transformation between the metric and holonomy variables is constructed which preserves their classical modular transformation properties. An extension of the definition of a unitary transformation is briefly discussed and is used to find the inner product in the holonomy variables which makes the canonical transformation unitary. This defines the Hilbert space in the Witten-Carlip formulation which is unitarily equivalent to the natural Hilbert space in the Moncrief formulation. In addition, gravitational theta-states arising from ``large'' diffeomorphisms are found in the theory.

31 pages LaTeX [Important Revision: a section is added constructing the inner product/Hilbert space for the Witten-Carlip holonomy formulation; the proof of unitary equivalence of the metric and holonomy formulations is then completed. Other additions include discussion of relation of canonical and unitary transformations. Title/abstract change.]