Related papers: Limits on Spacetime Foam
Recently a series of studies on high energy gamma-ray burst~(GRB) photons suggest a light speed variation with linear energy dependence at the Lorentz violation scale of $3.6 \times 10^{17}~\mathrm{GeV}$, with subluminal propagation of high…
Spacetime geometry is treated as a fluctuating, stochastic quantum system allowing an effective quantum gravity solution to the cosmological constant problem. A Focker-Planck equation for the probability density of spacetime metric…
It has been shown in [1] that a class of restricted spin foam models can feature a reduced spectral dimension of space-time. However, it is still an open question how curvature affects the flow of the spectral dimension. To answer this…
Several approaches to the quantum-gravity problem predict that spacetime should be "fuzzy", but have been so far unable to provide a crisp physical characterization of this notion. An intuitive picture of spacetime fuzziness has been…
Detecting a deviation from a featureless primordial power spectrum of fluctuations would give profound insight into the physics of the primordial Universe. Depending on their nature, primordial features can either provide direct evidence…
The regularized vacuum fluctuation related to a conformally coupled massless scalar field defined on a space-time with dynamical horizon is computed with respect a radially moving observer in a generic flat Friedmann-Robertson-Walker…
There are not many tools to quantitatively monitor the emergence of classical geometric features from a quantum spacetime, whose microscopic structure may be a highly quantum-fluctuating "spacetime foam". To improve this situation, we…
A satisfactory theory of quantum gravity will very likely require modification of our classical perception of space-time, perhaps by giving it a 'foamy' structure at scales of order the Planck length. This is expected to modify the…
The space-time metric is widely believed to be subject to stochastic fluctuations induced by quantum gravity at the Planck scale. This work is based on two different phenomenological approaches being currently made to this topic, and…
We present improved experimental bounds on typical length scales of a photon-propagation model with a frozen (time-independent) random background field, which could result from anomalous effects of a static, multiply connected spacetime…
The intimate geometry of space-time is expected to suffer stochastic fluctuations as a result of quantum gravitational effects. These fluctuations may induce observable consequences on the propagation of high energy particles over large…
We review a few topics in Planck-scale physics, with emphasis on possible manifestations in relatively low energy. The selected topics include quantum fluctuations of spacetime, their cumulative effects, uncertainties in energy-momentum…
The spectral dimension has proven to be a very informative observable to understand the properties of quantum geometries in approaches to quantum gravity. In loop quantum gravity and its spin foam description, it has not been possible so…
Quantum gravitational effects may induce stochastic fluctuations in the structure of space-time, to produce a characteristic foamy structure. It has been known for some time now that these fluctuations may have observable consequencies for…
Within a Liouville approach to non-critical string theory, we discuss space-time foam effects on the propagation of low-energy particles. We find an induced frequency-dependent dispersion in the propagation of a wave packet, and observe…
In some models of quantum gravity, space-time is thought to have a foamy structure with non-trivial optical properties. We probe the possibility that photons propagating in vacuum may exhibit a non-trivial refractive index, by analyzing the…
In this paper we study the effects of quantum scalar field vacuum fluctuations on scalar test particles in an analog model for the Friedmann-Robertson-Walker spatially flat geometry. In this scenario, the cases with one and two perfectly…
We present a method of directly testing whether time continues to have its usual meaning on scales of <= t_P = sqrt(hbar G/c^5) ~ 5.4E-44 s, the Planck time. According to quantum gravity, the time t of an event cannot be determined more…
A simple model of spacetime foam, made by $N$ wormholes in a semiclassical approximation, is taken under examination. The Casimir-like energy of the quantum fluctuation of such a model and its probability of being realized are computed.…
On small scales the observable Universe is highly inhomogeneous, with galaxies and clusters forming a complex web of voids and filaments. The optical properties of such configurations can be quite different from the perfectly smooth…