Summations over equilaterally triangulated surfaces and the critical string measure

We propose a new approach to the summation over dynamically triangulated Riemann surfaces which does not rely on properties of the potential in a matrix model. Instead, we formulate a purely algebraic discretization of critical string path integral. This is combined with a technique which assigns to each equilateral triangulation of a two-dimensional surface a Riemann surface defined over a certain finite extension of the field of rational numbers, i.e. an arthmetic surface. Thus we establish a new formulation in which the sum over randomly triangulated surfaces defines an invariant measure on the moduli space of arithmetic surfaces. It is shown that because of this it is far from obvious that this measure for large genera approximates the measure defined by the continuum theory, i.e. Liouville theory or critical string theory. In low genus this subtlety does not exist. In the case of critical string theory we explicity compute the volume of the moduli space of arithmetic surfaces in terms of the modular height function and show that for low genus it approximates correctly the continuum measure. We also discuss a continuum limit which bears some resemblance with a double scaling limit in matrix models.This work was supported in part by the Director, Office of Energy Research, Office of High Energy and Nuclear Physics, Division of High Energy Physics of the U.S. Department of Energy under Contract DE-AC03-76SF00098Supported in part by NSF grant PHY85-15857     

Graphene wormholes: A condensed matter illustration of Dirac fermions in curved space

We study the properties of graphene wormholes in which a short nanotube acts as a bridge between two graphene sheets, where the honeycomb carbon lattice is curved from the presence of 12 heptagonal defects. By taking the nanotube bridge with very small length compared to the radius, we develop an effective theory of Dirac fermions to account for the low-energy electronic properties of the wormholes in the continuum limit, where the frustration induced by the heptagonal defects is mimicked by a line of fictitious gauge flux attached to each of them. We find in particular that, when the effective gauge flux from the topological defects becomes maximal, the zero-energy modes of the Dirac equation can be arranged into two triplets, that can be thought as the counterpart of the two triplets of zero modes that arise in the dual instance of the continuum limit of large spherical fullerenes. We further investigate the graphene wormhole spectra by performing a numerical diagonalization of tight-binding Hamiltonians for very large lattices realizing the wormhole geometry. The correspondence between the number of localized electronic states observed in the numerical approach and the effective gauge flux predicted in the continuum limit shows that graphene wormholes can be consistently described by an effective theory of two Dirac fermion fields in the curved geometry of the wormhole, opening the possibility of using real samples of the carbon material as a playground to experiment with the interaction between the background curvature and the Dirac fields.     

A rigorous construction of the chiral anomaly on a spin manifold

The quantum field for Dirac fermion is rigorously formulated on a compact spin manifold by using the functional integral defined as the continuum limit of a lattice approximation with a new action. Within this framework, the chiral anomaly for a fermion interacting with gauge as well as gravitational fields is calculated with mathematical rigor.     

Tunnelling with a negative cosmological constant

The point of this paper is to see what light new results in hyperbolic geometry may throw on gravitational entropy and whether gravitational entropy is relevant for the quantum origin of the universe. We introduce some new gravitational instantons which mediate the birth from nothing of closed universes containing wormholes and suggest that they may contribute to the density matrix of the universe. We also discuss the connection between their gravitational action and the topological and volumetric entropies introduced in hyperbolic geometry. These coincide for hyperbolic 4-manifolds, and increase with increasing topological complexity of the 4-manifold. We raise the question of whether the action also increases with the topological complexity of the initial 3-geometry, measured either by its 3-volume or its Matveev complexity. We point out, in distinction to the non-supergravity case, that universes with domains of negative cosmological constant separated by supergravity domain walls cannot be born from nothing. Finally we point out that our wormholes provide examples of the type of Perpetual Motion machines envisaged by Frolov and Novikov.     

Coherent state path integral methods and central limit theorem

We consider a coherent state path integral expression originating for example after path integration over a second interacting system and by using a method based on the use of the central limit theorem on the phase of the path integral representation, we extract under certain conditions a closed form for the propagator.     

Haldane limits via Lagrangian embeddings

In the present paper we revisit the so-called Haldane limit, i.e. a particular continuum limit, which leads from a spin chain to a sigma model. We use the coherent state formulation of the path integral to reduce the problem to a semiclassical one, which leads us to the observation that the Haldane limit is closely related to a Lagrangian embedding into the classical phase space of the spin chain. Using this property, we find a spin chain whose limit produces a relativistic sigma model with target space the manifold of complete flags U(3)/U³(1). We discuss possible other future applications of Lagrangian/isotropic embeddings in this context.     

Second-order phase transition in causal dynamical triangulations

Causal dynamical triangulations are a concrete attempt to define a nonperturbative path integral for quantum gravity. We present strong evidence that the lattice theory has a second-order phase transition line, which can potentially be used to define a continuum limit in the conventional sense of nongravitational lattice theories.     

Wormhole supported by dark energy admitting conformal motion

In this article, we study the possibility of sustaining static and spherically symmetric traversable wormhole geometries admitting conformal motion in Einstein gravity, which presents a more systematic approach to search a relation between matter and geometry. In wormhole physics, the presence of exotic matter is a fundamental ingredient and we show that this exotic source can be dark energy type which support the existence of wormhole spacetimes. In this work we model a wormhole supported by dark energy which admits conformal motion. We also discuss the possibility of the detection of wormholes in the outer regions of galactic halos by means of gravitational lensing. Studies of the total gravitational energy for the exotic matter inside a static wormhole configuration are also performed.     

Path integrals on symmetric spaces and group manifolds

Invariant path integrals on symmetric and group spaces are defined in terms of a sum over the paths formed by broken geodesic segments. Their evaluation proceeds by using the mean value properties of functions over the geodesic and complex radius spheres. It is shown that on symmetric spaces the invariant path integral gives a kernel of the Schrödinger equation in terms of the spectral resolution of the zonal functions of the space. On compact group spaces the invariant path integral reduces to a sum over powers of Gaussian-type integrals which, for a free particle, yields the standard Van Vleck-Pauli propagator. Explicit calculations are performed for the case ofSU(2) andU(N) group spaces.     

Global aspects of gauged Wess-Zumino-Witten models

A study of the gauged Wess-Zumino-Witten models is given focusing on the effect of topologically non-trivial configurations of gauge fields. A correlation function is expressed as an integral over a moduli space of holomorphic bundles with quasi-parabolic structure. Two actions of the fundamental group of the gauge group is defined: One on the space of gauge invariant local fields and the other on the moduli spaces. Applying these in the integral expression, we obtain a certain identity which relates correlation functions for configurations of different topologies. It gives an important information on the topological sum for the partition and correlation functions.     

The supersymmetric one-dimensional string

We consider a supersymmetric discretized string. The full string theory is defined as the sum over the triangulations of the surface, which is imbedded in the superspace. In the continuum limit such a string theory is described by an appropriate Wess-Zumino model. We present an explicit computation of the properties of the string in the ID case: we find that supersymmetry is spontaneously broken.     

Feynman-Schwinger technique in field theories

In these lectures we introduce the Feynman-Schwinger representation method for solying nonperturbative problems in field theory. As an introduction we first give a brief overview of integral equations and path integral methods for solving nonperturbative problems. Then we discuss the Feynman-Schwinger (FSR) representation method with applications to scalar interactions. The FSR approach is a continuum path integral integral approach in terms of covariant trajectories of particles. Using the exact results provided by the FSR approach we test the reliability of commonly used approximations for nonperturbative summation of interactions for few body systems.     

Fluctuations in the Weakly Asymmetric Exclusion Process with Open Boundary Conditions

We investigate the fluctuations around the average density profile in the weakly asymmetric exclusion process with open boundaries in the steady state. We show that these fluctuations are given, in the macroscopic limit, by a centered Gaussian field and we compute explicitly its covariance function. We use two approaches. The first method is dynamical and based on fluctuations around the hydrodynamic limit. We prove that the density fluctuations evolve macroscopically according to an autonomous stochastic equation, and we search for the stationary distribution of this evolution. The second approach, which is based on a representation of the steady state as a sum over paths, allows one to write the density fluctuations in the steady state as a sum over two independent processes, one of which is the derivative of a Brownian motion, the other one being related to a random path in a potential.     

Neutrino Oscillations in Exotic Geometries and the Equivalence Principle Violation

Taking into account the violation of the equivalence principle, we analyze the propagation of neutrinos in the gravitational field generated by wormholes. The analysis is performed for massive and massless neutrinos. By using the constraints on the (negative) mass of wormholes, which is of the order of stellar-substellar masses, we determine constraints on f which characterizes the degree of violation of the equivalence principle.     

Dynamical Conformal Transformation and Classical Euclidean Wormholes

We investigate the necessary condition for the existence of classical Euclidean wormholes in a conformally non-invariant gravitational model minimally coupled to an scalar field. It is shown that while the original Ricci tensor with positive eigenvalues does not allow the Euclidean wormholes to occur, under dynamical conformal transformations the Ricci tensor, with respect to the original metric, is dynamically coupled with the conformal field and its eigenvalues may become negative allowing the Euclidean wormholes to occur. Therefore, it is conjectured that dynamical conformal transformations may provide us with effective forms of matter sources leading to Euclidean wormholes in conformally non-invariant systems.     

Traversable braneworld wormholes supported by astrophysical observations

In this study, we investigate the characteristics and properties of a traversable wormhole constrained by the current astrophysical observations in the framework of modified theories of gravity (MOG). As a concrete case, we study traversable wormhole space–time configurations in the Dvali–Gabadadze–Porrati (DGP) braneworld scenario, which are supported by the effects of the gravity leakage of extra dimensions. We find that the wormhole space–time structure will open in terms of the 2σ confidence level when we utilize the joint constraints supernovae (SNe) Ia + observational Hubble parameter data (OHD) + Planck + gravitational wave (GW) and z < 0:2874. Furthermore, we obtain several model-independent conclusions, such as (i) the exotic matter threading the wormholes can be divided into four classes during the evolutionary processes of the universe based on various energy conditions; (ii) we can offer a strict restriction to the local wormhole space–time structure by using the current astrophysical observations; and (iii) we can clearly identify a physical gravitational resource for the wormholes supported by astrophysical observations, namely the dark energy components of the universe or equivalent space–time curvature effects from MOG. Moreover, we find that the strong energy condition is always violated at low redshifts.     

The Anomaly Line Bundle of the Self-Dual Field Theory

In this work, we determine explicitly the anomaly line bundle of the abelian self-dual field theory over the space of metrics modulo diffeomorphisms, including its torsion part. Inspired by the work of Belov and Moore, we propose a non-covariant action principle for a pair of Euclidean self-dual fields on a generic oriented Riemannian manifold. The corresponding path integral allows one to study the global properties of the partition function over the space of metrics modulo diffeomorphisms. We show that the anomaly bundle for a pair of self-dual fields differs from the determinant bundle of the Dirac operator coupled to chiral spinors by a flat bundle that is not trivial if the underlying manifold has middle-degree cohomology, and whose holonomies are determined explicitly. We briefly sketch the relevance of this result for the computation of the global gravitational anomaly of the self-dual field theory, that will appear in another paper.     

Gravitational Microlensing by Ellis Wormhole: Second Order Effects

Gravitational lensing is the effect of light bending in a gravitational field. It can be used as a possible observational method to detect or exclude the existence of wormholes. In this work, we extend the work by Abe on gravitational microlensing by Ellis wormhole by including the second order deflection term. Using the lens equation and definition of Einstein radius, we find the angular locations of the physical image inside and outside Einstein ring. The work contains a comparative analysis of light curves between the Schwarzschild black hole and the Ellis wormhole that can be used to distinguish such objects though such distinctions are too minute to be observable even in the near future. We also tabulate the optical depth and event rate for lensing by bulge and Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) stars.