Related papers: $\infty-\infty$: vacuum energy and virtual black-h…
We assume the space-time foam picture in which the vacuum is filled with a gas of virtual wormholes. It is shown that virtual wormholes form a finite (of the Planckian order) value of the energy density of zero-point fluctuations. However…
The cosmological constant problem is the principal obstacle in the attempt to interpret dark energy as the quantum vacuum energy. We suggest that the obstacle can be removed, i.e. that the cosmological constant problem can be resolved by…
The origin of the observed acceleration of the expansion of the universe is a major problem of modern cosmology and theoretical physics. Simple estimations of the contribution of vacuum to the density energy of the universe in quantum field…
Black holes are an apparently unavoidable prediction of classical General Relativity, at least if matter obeys the strong energy condition rho + 3p > 0. However quantum vacuum fluctuations generally violate this condition, as does the eq.…
The gargantuan discrepancy between the value of the observed cosmological constant and that expected from the zero-point energy of known matter fields can be eliminated by supposing that on macroscopic scales the overwhelming majority of…
We discuss the main myths related to the vacuum energy and cosmological constant, such as: ``unbearable lightness of space-time''; the dominating contribution of zero point energy of quantum fields to the vacuum energy; non-zero vacuum…
In this paper we shall consistently third quantize modified gravity. Then we shall analyse certain aspects of virtual black holes in this third quantized modified gravity. We will see how a statistical mechanical origin for the…
The two apparently distinct phenomena of dark energy (or late-time cosmic acceleration) and quantum gravity dominate physics on extremely low, and extremely high energies, but do not seem to have any apparent empirical connection.…
We consider a possibility that the formally infinite vacuum energy of the quantized matter fields could be stored into Planck-size quantum black holes acting as the fundamental constituents of space and time. Using the recently proposed…
As shown recently (W. Kummer, H. Liebl, D.V. Vassilevich, Nucl. Phys. B 544, 403 (1999)) 2d quantum gravity theories --- including spherically reduced Einstein-gravity --- after an exact path integral of its geometric part can be treated…
Considering the fundamental cutoff applied by the uncertainty relations' limit on virtual particles' frequency in the quantum vacuum, it is shown that the vacuum energy density is proportional to the inverse of the forth power of the…
We revisit the question of the contributions of Planckian quantum black holes in general and of remnants in particular to low energy physics observables. As long as quantum gravity preserves the symmetries of the low energy effective field…
Vacuum energy in quantum field theory, being the sum of zero-point energies of all field modes, is formally infinite but yet, after regularization or renormalization, can give rise to finite observable effects. One way of understanding how…
We consider three fundamental issues in quantum gravity: (a) the black hole information paradox (b) the unboundedness of entropy that can be stored inside a black hole horizon (c) the relation between the black hole horizon and the…
The problem of cosmological constant and vacuum energy is usually thought of as the subject of general relativity. However, the vacuum energy is important for the Universe even in the absence of gravity, i.e. in the case when the Newton…
We study the backreaction of quantum fields induced through the vacuum polarization and the conformal anomaly on the collapse of a thin shell of dust. It is shown that the final fate of the collapse process depends on the physical…
A modification to the time-energy uncertainty relation in quantum gravity has been interpreted as increasing the duration of fluctuations producing virtual black holes with masses greater than the Planck mass. I point out that such virtual…
Observations provide increasingly strong evidence that the universe is accelerating. This revolutionary advance in cosmological observations confronts theoretical cosmology with a tremendous challenge, which it has so far failed to meet.…
We solve the Klein-Gordon equation for a scalar field, in the background geometry of a dust cloud collapsing to form a black hole, everywhere in the (1+1) spacetime: that is, both inside and outside the event horizon and arbitrarily close…
It is shown that quantum vacuum fluctuations give rise to a curvature of space-time of the order appropriate to explain the observed accelerated expansion of the universe. The fact that the fluctuations produce curvature, even if the…