English

Further results on geometric operators in quantum gravity

General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology 2009-10-28 v1 High Energy Physics - Theory

Abstract

We investigate some properties of geometric operators in canonical quantum gravity in the connection approach \`a la Ashtekar, which are associated with volume, area and length of spatial regions. We motivate the construction of analogous discretized lattice quantities, compute various quantum commutators of the type [area,volume], [area,length] and [volume,length], and find they are generally non-vanishing. Although our calculations are performed mostly within a lattice-regularized approach, some are -- for special, fixed spin-network configurations -- identical with corresponding continuum computations. Comparison with the structure of the discretized theory leads us to conclude that anomalous commutators may be a general feature of operators constructed along similar lines within a continuum loop representation of quantum general relativity. -- The validity of the lattice approach remains unaffected.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.gr-qc/9612068,
  title  = {Further results on geometric operators in quantum gravity},
  author = {R. Loll},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:gr-qc/9612068},
  year   = {2009}
}

Comments

24 pages, TeX, 3 figures (epsf)

R2 v1 2026-07-22T12:52:38.049Z