Related papers: BF Actions for the Husain-Kuchar Model

We study a generalized action for gravity as a constrained BF theory, and its relationship with the Plebanski action. We analyse the discretization of the constraints and the spin foam quantization of the theory, showing that it leads…

We study the state-sum models of quantum gravity based on a representation 2-category of the Poincare 2-group. We call them spin-cube models, since they are categorical generalizations of spin-foam models. A spin-cube state sum can be…

We consider the quantum mechanical analog of the nonlinear sigma model. There are difficulties to completely embed this theory by directly using the Batalin, Fradkin, Fradkina, and Tyutin (BFFT) formalism. We show in this paper how the BFFT…

We provide several examples of higher gauge theories, constructed as generalizations of a BF model to 2BF and 3BF models with constraints. Using the framework of higher category theory, we introduce appropriate 2-groups and 3-groups, and…

We study the Husain-Kuchar model by introducing a new action principle similar to the self-dual action used in the Ashtekar variables approach to Quantum Gravity. This new action has several interesting features; among them, the presence of…

We explain how General Relativity with a cosmological constant arises as a broken symmetry phase of a BF theory. In particular we show how to treat de Sitter and anti-de Sitter cases simultaneously. This is then used to formulate a…

We formulate Bohmian mechanics (BM) such that the main objects of concern are macroscopic phenomena, while microscopic particle trajectories only play an auxiliary role. Such a formulation makes it easy to understand why BM always makes the…

We study the action for the three-space formalism of General Relativity, better known as the BF\'O (Barbour--Foster--\'O Murchadha) action, which is a square-root BSW (Baierlein--Sharp--Wheeler) action. In particular, we explore the…

In this paper we study the 3D gauge theory of two tensor gauge fields: $a_{\mu\nu}(x)$, which we take symmetric, and $B_{\mu\nu}(x)$, with no symmetry on its indices. The corresponding invariant action is a higher-rank BF-like model, which…

The covariant canonical formalism for four-dimensional BF theory is performed. The aim of the paper is to understand in the context of the covariant canonical formalism both the reducibility that some first class constraints have in Dirac's…

Several approaches to the dynamics of loop quantum gravity involve discretizing the equations of motion. The resulting discrete theories are known to be problematic since the first class algebra of constraints of the continuum theory…

In this paper explore the relation between covariant and canonical approaches to quantum gravity and $BF$ theory. We will focus on the dynamical triangulation and spin-foam models, which have in common that they can be defined in terms of…

We present two results on the recently proposed new spin foam models. First, we show how a (slightly modified) restriction on representations in the EPRL model leads to the appearance of the Ashtekar-Barbero connection, thus bringing this…

We describe how a spin-foam state sum model can be reformulated as a quantum field theory of spin networks, such that the Feynman diagrams of that field theory are the spin-foam amplitudes. In the case of open spin networks, we obtain a new…

In this paper we consider the quantization of the 2d BF model coupled to topological matter. Guided by the rigid supersymmetry this system can be viewed as a super-BF model, where the field content is expressed in terms of superfields. A…

The BRST quantization of particle motion on the hypersurface $V_{(N-1)}$ embedded in Euclidean space $R_N$ is carried out both in Hamiltonian and Lagrangian formalism. Using Batalin-Fradkin-Fradkina-Tyutin (BFFT) formalism, the second class…

It is well known that, in the first-order formalism, pure three-dimensional gravity is just the BF theory. Similarly, four-dimensional general relativity can be formulated as BF theory with an additional constraint term added to the…

Canonical quantization of abelian BF-type topological field theory coupled to extended sources on generic d-dimensional manifolds and with curved line bundles is studied. Sheaf cohomology is used to construct the appropriate topological…

This paper introduces a general perturbative quantization scheme for gauge theories on manifolds with boundary, compatible with cutting and gluing, in the cohomological symplectic (BV-BFV) formalism. Explicit examples, like abelian BF…

Group field theories represent a 2nd quantized reformulation of the loop quantum gravity state space and a completion of the spin foam formalism. States of the canonical theory, in the traditional continuum setting, have support on graphs…