Related papers: Spinfoams: Foundations
In the quest of a physical theory of quantum gravity, spin foam models, or in short spinfoams, propose a well-defined path integral summing over quantized discrete space-time geometries. At the crossroad of topological quantum field theory,…
The spinfoam framework is a proposal for a regularized path integral for quantum gravity. Spinfoams define quantum space-time structures describing the evolution in time of the spin network states for quantum geometry derived from Loop…
This is my Th\`ese d'Habilitation (HDR) on the topic of spinfoam models for quantum gravity, which I presented in l'Ecole Normale Sup\'erieure de Lyon on december 16 2010. The spinfoam framework is a proposal for a regularized path integral…
Spin Foam Models (SFMs) are covariant formulations of Loop Quantum Gravity (LQG) in 4 dimensions. This work studies the perturbations of SFMs on a flat background. It demonstrates for the first time that smooth curved spacetime geometries…
The simplicial framework of Engle-Pereira-Rovelli-Livine spin-foam models is generalized to match the diffeomorphism invariant framework of loop quantum gravity. The simplicial spin-foams are generalized to arbitrary linear 2-cell…
We give a brief review of the problem of quantum gravity. After the discussion of the nonrenormalizability of general relativity, we briefly mention the main research directions which aim to resolve this problem. Our attention then focuses…
This series of lectures gives a simple and self-contained introduction to the non-perturbative and background independent loop approach of canonical quantum gravity. The Hilbert space of kinematical quantum states is constructed and a…
We study the coupling of massive fermions to the quantum mechanical dynamics of spacetime emerging from the spinfoam approach in three dimensions. We first recall the classical theory before constructing a spinfoam model of quantum gravity…
In this thesis we study the flat model, the main buidling block for the spinfoam approach to quantum gravity, with an emphasis on its divergences. Besides a personal introduction to the problem of quantum gravity, the manuscript consists in…
We apply the technique of spinfoam to study the space-time which, classically, contains a curvature singularity. We derive from the full covariant Loop Quantum Gravity (LQG) that the region near curvature singularity has to be of strong…
Quantum cosmology is usually studied quantizing symmetry-reduced variables. Is it possible, instead, to define quantum cosmology starting from the full quantum gravity theory? In Loop Quantum Gravity (LQG), it is possible to cut the degrees…
Loop quantum gravity has provided us with a canonical framework especially devised for background independent and diffeomorphism invariant gauge field theories. In this quantization the fundamental excitations are called spin network…
The spin foam framework provides a way to define the dynamics of canonical loop quantum gravity in a spacetime covariant way, by using a path integral over histories of quantum states which can be interpreted as `quantum space-times'. This…
We consider spinfoam quantum gravity. We show in a simple case that the amplitude projects over a nontrivial (curved) classical geometry. This suggests that, at least for spinfoams without bubbles and for large values of the boundary spins,…
Spinfoam models provide a covariant formulation of the dynamics of loop quantum gravity. They are non-perturbatively defined in the group field theory (GFT) framework: the GFT partition function defines the sum of spinfoam transition…
Starting from the reformulation of the classical phase space of Loop Quantum Gravity in terms of spinor variables and spinor networks, we build coherent spin network states and show how to use them to write the spinfoam path integral for…
The path-integral approach to cosmology consists in the computation of transition amplitudes between states of the quantum geometry of the universe. In the past, the concrete computation of these transitions amplitudes has been performed in…
The present thesis is divided into two main research areas: Classical Cosmology and (Loop) Quantum Gravity. The first part concerns cosmological models with one phantom and one scalar field, that provide the `super-accelerated' scenario not…
In this paper, an open quantum system theory for spinfoams is developed. This new formalism aims at deriving an effective Lindblad equation to compute the reduced dynamics of a quantum gravitational field. The system parameters are…
We present a spinfoam formulation of Lorentzian quantum General Relativity. The theory is based on a simple generalization of an Euclidean model defined in terms of a field theory over a group. The model is an extension of a recently…