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A study of the diffusion of a passive Brownian particle on the surface of a sphere and subject to the effects of an external potential, coupled linearly to the probability density of the particle's position, is presented through a numerical…
This is an introduction to spin foam models for non-perturbative quantum gravity, an approach that lies at the point of convergence of many different research areas, including loop quantum gravity, topological quantum field theories, path…
We develop a new perspective on the discretization of the phase space structure of gravity in 2+1 dimensions as a piecewise-flat geometry in 2 spatial dimensions. Starting from a subdivision of the continuum geometric and phase space…
We study the euclidean covariant loop-quantum-gravity vertex numerically, using a cylindrically symmetric boundary state and a convenient value of the Barbero-Immirzi parameter. We show that a classical geometry emerges already at low spin.…
Using the Ashtekar formulation, it is shown that the G_{Newton} --> 0 limit of Euclidean or complexified general relativity is not a free field theory, but is a theory that describes a linearized self-dual connection propagating on an…
We present a path integral formalism for quantising gravity in the form of the spectral action. Our basic principle is to sum over all Dirac operators. The approach is demonstrated on two simple finite noncommutative geometries: the…
In the last 20 years, loop quantum gravity, a background independent approach to unify general relativity and quantum mechanics, has been widely investigated. The aim of loop quantum gravity is to construct a mathematically rigorous,…
Various theories of Quantum Gravity predict modifications of the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle near the Planck scale to a so-called Generalized Uncertainty Principle (GUP). In some recent papers, we showed that the GUP gives rise to…
In this thesis we investigate the importance of causality in non-perturbative approaches to quantum gravity. Firstly, causal sets are introduced as a simple kinematical model for causal geometry. It is shown how causal sets could account…
We show how to formulate a lattice gauge theory whose naive continuum limit corresponds to two-dimensional (Euclidean) quantum gravity including a positive cosmological constant. More precisely the resultant continuum theory corresponds to…
Three-dimensional Lorentzian quantum gravity, expressed as the continuum limit of a nonperturbative sum over spacetimes, is tantalizingly close to being amenable to analytical methods, and some of its properties have been described in terms…
I argue that the complete partition function of 3D quantum gravity is given by a path integral over gauge-inequivalent manifolds times the Chern-Simons partition function. In a discrete version, it gives a sum over simplicial complexes…
Recent studies have shown that the nonlinear optical response of crystalline systems is fundamentally a quantum geometric property. In this work, we propose two-dimensional coherent spectroscopy (2DCS), which measures the nonlinear…
Black Holes have always played a central role in investigations of quantum gravity. This includes both conceptual issues such as the role of classical singularities and information loss, and technical ones to probe the consistency of…
We discuss some aspects of the metric configuration space in quantum gravity in the background field formalism. We give a necessary and sufficient condition for the parameterization of Euclidean metric fluctuations such that i) the…
We explore an extended coupling constant space of 4d regularized Euclidean quantum gravity, defined via the formalism of dynamical triangulations. We add a measure term which can also serve as a generalized higher curvature term and…
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…
One could begin a study like the present one by simply postulating that our universe is four-dimensional. There are ample reasons for doing this. Experience, observation and experiment all point to the fact that we inhabit a…
We consider some general aspects of the new noncommutative or quantum geometry coming out of the theory of quantum groups, in connection with Planck scale physics. A generalisation of Fourier or wave-particle duality on curved spaces…
We analyze the disordered Riemannian geometry resulting from random perturbations of the Euclidean metric. We focus on geodesics, the paths traced out by a particle traveling in this quenched random environment. By taking the point of the…