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All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
DOE OSTI2023

Encoding beyond cosmological horizons in de Sitter JT gravity

Black hole event horizons and cosmological event horizons share many properties, making it natural to ask whether our recent advances in understanding black holes generalize to cosmology. To this end, we discuss a paradox that occurs if observers can access what lies beyond their cosmological horizon in the same way that they can access what lies beyond a black hole horizon. In particular, distinct observers with distinct horizons may encode the same portion of spacetime, violating the no-cloning theorem of quantum mechanics. This paradox is due precisely to the observer-dependence of the cosmological horizon — the sharpest difference from a black hole horizon — although we will argue that the gravity path integral avoids the paradox in controlled examples.

2D gravity↗
DOE OSTI2020

Holographic probes of inner horizons

We study the inner horizons of rotating and charged black holes in anti-de Sitter space. These black holes have a classical analytic extension through the inner horizon to additional asymptotic regions. If this extension survives in the quantum theory, it requires particular analytic properties in a dual CFT, which give a prescription for calculating correlation functions for operators placed on any asymptotic boundary of the maximally extended spacetime. We show that for charged black holes in three or greater dimensions, and rotating black holes in four or greater dimensions, these analytic properties are inconsistent in the dual CFT, implying the absence of an analytic extension for quantum fields past the inner horizon. Thus, we find that strong cosmic censorship holds for all AdS black holes except rotating BTZ. To further study the latter case, we insert classical perturbations near the boundary at late times, producing shockwaves traveling along the inner horizon. We holographically compute CFT correlators in this background that probe a high energy scattering process near the inner horizon and argue that the shockwave does not destabilize the inner horizon violently enough to prevent signaling between different asymptotic regions of the Penrose diagram. This provides evidence that the rotating BTZ black hole does violate the strong cosmic censorship conjecture.

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSIC↗
DOE OSTI2022

Slowly rotating gravastars

We solve Einstein’s equations for slowly rotating gravitational condensate stars (gravastars) up to second order in the rotation by expanding about the spherically symmetric gravastar with de Sitter interior and Schwarzschild exterior matched at their common horizon. Requiring that the perturbations are finite on the null surface reduces the exterior geometry to that of a Kerr black hole, implying that a slowly rotating gravastar cannot be distinguished from a Kerr black hole by any measurement or observation restricted to the macroscopic spacetime exterior to the horizon. Here we determine the interior solution, the surface stress tensor, and the Komar mass and angular momentum localized on the slowly rotating horizon surface. With the interior equation of state fixed at p = –ρ, finite junction conditions on the null horizon surface necessarily lead to an interior solution with a singular core, where the perturbative expansion breaks down. Comparison to other models and implications for more rapidly rotating gravastars are briefly discussed.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2024

Universal bounds on CFT Distance Conjecture

For any unitary conformal field theory in two dimensions with the central charge c, we prove that, if there is a nontrivial primary operator whose conformal dimension ∆ vanishes in some limit on the conformal manifold, the Zamolodchikov distance t to the limit is infinite, the approach to this limit is exponential ∆ = exp(−αt + O(1)), and the decay rate obeys the universal bounds c−1/2 ≤ α ≤ 1. In the limit, we also find that an infinite tower of primary operators emerges without a gap above the vacuum and that the conformal field theory becomes locally a tensor product of a sigma-model in the large radius limit and a compact theory. As a corollary, we establish a part of the Distance Conjecture about gravitational theories in three-dimensional anti-de Sitter space. In particular, our bounds on α indicate that the emergence of exponentially light states is inevitable as the moduli field corresponding to t rolls beyond the Planck scale along the steepest path and that this phenomenon can begin already at the curvature scale of the bulk geometry. We also comment on implications of our bounds for gravity in asymptotically flat spacetime by taking the flat space limit and compare with the Sharpened Distance Conjecture.

AdS-CFT Correspondence↗
DOE OSTI2022

Characters, quasinormal modes, and Schwinger pairs in dS 2 with flux

An integral representation of the 1-loop partition function for charged scalars and spinors, minimally coupled to a uniform U(1) field on S 2 , is given in terms of SO(1, 2) Harish-Chandra group characters and evaluated exactly in terms of Hurwitz ζ-functions. Analytically continuing the U(1) field, we interpret the path integrals as quasicanonical partition functions in dS 2 with an electric field. The character itself is obtained as a trace over states living at the future boundary of de Sitter and has a quasinormal mode expansion. The imaginary part of the partition function captures Schwinger pair creation in the static patch at finite temperature. The thermal enhancement is most noticeable for scalar masses below Hubble and leads to non-monotonicity of the current as a function of the field. This parameter range, when dimensionally reducing from a charged or rotating Nariai spacetime, is excluded by Swampland-inspired bounds. Around the AdS 2 black hole, in contrast to dS 2 , there is a threshold to pair creation.

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSIC↗
DOE OSTI2022

Traversable wormhole dynamics on a quantum processor

The holographic principle, theorized to be a property of quantum gravity, postulates that the description of a volume of space can be encoded on a lower-dimensional boundary. The anti-de Sitter (AdS)/conformal field theory correspondence or duality is the principal example of holography. The Sachdev–Ye–Kitaev (SYK) model of N >> 1 Majorana fermions has features suggesting the existence of a gravitational dual in AdS 2 , and is a new realization of holography. Here, we invoke the holographic correspondence of the SYK many-body system and gravity to probe the conjectured ER=EPR relation between entanglement and spacetime geometry through the traversable wormhole mechanism as implemented in the SYK model. A qubit can be used to probe the SYK traversable wormhole dynamics through the corresponding teleportation protocol. This can be realized as a quantum circuit, equivalent to the gravitational picture in the semiclassical limit of an infinite number of qubits. Here we use learning techniques to construct a sparsified SYK model that we experimentally realize with 164 two-qubit gates on a nine-qubit circuit and observe the corresponding traversable wormhole dynamics. Despite its approximate nature, the sparsified SYK model preserves key properties of the traversable wormhole physics: perfect size winding, coupling on either side of the wormhole that is consistent with a negative energy shockwave, a Shapiro time delay, causal time-order of signals emerging from the wormhole, and scrambling and thermalization dynamics. Our experiment was run on the Google Sycamore processor. By interrogating a two-dimensional gravity dual system, our work represents a step towards a program for studying quantum gravity in the laboratory. Future developments will require improved hardware scalability and performance as well as theoretical developments including higher-dimensional quantum gravity duals and other SYK-like models.

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSIC↗
DOE OSTI2020

Warping wormholes with dust: a metric construction of the Python’s Lunch

We show how wormholes in three spacetime dimensions can be customizably warped using pressureless matter. In particular, we exhibit a large new class of solutions in (2 + 1)-dimensional general relativity with energy-momentum tensor describing a negative cosmological constant and positive-energy dust. From this class of solutions, we construct wormhole geometries and study their geometric and holographic properties, including Ryu- Takayanagi surfaces, entanglement wedge cross sections, mutual information, and outer entropy. Finally, we construct a Python’s Lunch geometry: a wormhole in asymptotically anti-de Sitter space with a local maximum in size near its middle.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗
DOE OSTI2020

Higher spin partition functions via the quasinormal mode method in de Sitter quantum gravity

In this note we compute the 1-loop partition function of spin- s s fields on Euclidean de Sitter space S^{2n+1} S 2 n + 1 using the quasinormal mode method. Instead of computing the quasinormal mode frequencies from scratch, we use the analytic continuation prescription L_{\text{AdS}}\to iL_{\text{dS}} L AdS → i L dS , appearing in the dS/CFT correspondence, and Wick rotate the normal mode frequencies of fields on thermal \text{AdS}_{2n+1} AdS 2 n + 1 into the quasinormal mode frequencies of fields on de Sitter space. We compare the quasinormal mode and heat kernel methods of calculating 1-loop determinants, finding exact agreement, and furthermore explicitly relate these methods via a sum over the conformal dimension. We discuss how the Wick rotation of normal modes on thermal \text{AdS}_{2n+1} AdS 2 n + 1 can be generalized to calculating 1-loop partition functions on the thermal spherical quotients S^{2n+1}/\mathbb{Z}_{p} S 2 n + 1 / ℤ p . We further show that the quasinormal mode frequencies encode the group theoretic structure of the spherical spacetimes in question, analogous to the analysis made for thermal AdS in [1-3] .

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSIC↗
DOE OSTI2021

Gravity Probe Spin: Prospects for measuring general-relativistic precession of intrinsic spin using a ferromagnetic gyroscope

An experimental test at the intersection of quantum physics and general relativity is proposed: measurement of relativistic frame dragging and geodetic precession using intrinsic spin of electrons. Furthermore, the behavior of intrinsic spin in spacetime dragged and warped by a massive rotating body is an experimentally open question, hence the results of such a measurement could have important theoretical consequences. Such a measurement is possible by using mm-scale ferromagnetic gyroscopes in orbit around the Earth. Under conditions where the rotational angular momentum of a ferromagnet is sufficiently small, a ferromagnet’s angular momentum is dominated by atomic electron spins and is predicted to exhibit macroscopic gyroscopic behavior. If such a ferromagnetic gyroscope is sufficiently isolated from the environment, rapid averaging of quantum uncertainty via the spin-lattice interaction enables readout of the ferromagnetic gyroscope dynamics with sufficient sensitivity to measure both the Lense-Thirring (frame dragging) and de Sitter (geodetic precession) effects due to the Earth.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2025

The wavefunction of a quantum S 1 × S 2 universe

We study quantum gravity corrections to the no-boundary wavefunction describing a universe with spatial topology S 1 × S 2 . It has been suggested that quantum effects become increasingly important when the size of the circle is large relative to the sphere. In this paper, we confirm this claim by an explicit four-dimensional one-loop calculation of the gravitational path integral preparing such a state. In the process, we clarify some aspects of the gravitational path integral on complex spacetimes. These quantum corrections play a crucial role in ensuring that the norm of the wavefunction is naturally expressed in terms of a path integral over S 2 × S 2 at the classical level. We extend some of the analysis to more general spatial topologies, as well as to the inclusion of fermions.

cosmological models↗
DOE OSTI2024

Universality in logarithmic temperature corrections to near-extremal rotating black hole thermodynamics in various dimensions

The low-temperature thermodynamics of near-extremal rotating black holes has recently been revisited to incorporate one-loop contributions that are dominant in this regime. We discuss these quantum corrections to the gravitational path integral for asymptotically Anti de-Sitter black holes in four and five dimensions. In four dimensions we explicitly consider Kerr-AdS 4 , Kerr-Newman-AdS 4 and the rotating black hole in $\mathcal{N}$ = 4 gauged supergravity with two scalars and two electric charges turned on. In five dimensions we explicitly address the asymptotically flat Myers-Perry black hole and the Kerr-AdS5 black hole. In every case we find that tensor modes contribute $\frac{3}{2}$logT Hawking to the low-temperature thermodynamics. We identify the root cause of this universality in two facts: (i) the universal presence of a SL(2, $\mathbb{R}$) subgroup of isometries in the near-horizon geometry and (ii) a set of cancellations in the Lichnerowicz operator. We show that these two conditions hold for near-extremal black holes in asymptotically flat and asymptotically AdS spacetimes of various dimensions.

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSIC↗
DOE OSTI2025

Differential equations for cosmological correlators

Cosmological fluctuations retain a memory of the physics that generated them in their spatial correlations. The strength of correlations varies smoothly as a function of external kinematics, which is encoded in differential equations satisfied by cosmological correlation functions. In this work, we provide a broader perspective on the origin and structure of these differential equations. As a concrete example, we study conformally coupled scalar fields in a power-law cosmology. The wavefunction coefficients in this model have integral representations, with the integrands being the product of the corresponding flat-space results and “twist factors” that depend on the cosmological evolution. Similar twisted integrals arise for loop amplitudes in dimensional regularization, and their recent study has led to the discovery of rich mathematical structures and powerful new tools for computing multi-loop Feynman integrals in quantum field theory. The integrals of interest in cosmology are also part of a finite-dimensional basis of master integrals, which satisfy a system of first-order differential equations. We develop a formalism to derive these differential equations for arbitrary tree graphs. The results can be represented in graphical form by associating the singularities of the differential equations with a set of graph tubings. Upon differentiation, these tubings grow in a local and predictive fashion. In fact, a few remarkably simple rules allow us to predict — by hand — the equations for all tree graphs. While the rules of this “kinematic flow” are defined purely in terms of data on the boundary of the spacetime, they reflect the physics of bulk time evolution. We also study the analogous structures in tr ϕ 3 theory, and see some glimpses of hidden structure in the sum over planar graphs. This suggests that there is an autonomous combinatorial or geometric construction from which cosmological correlations, and the associated spacetime, emerge.

Cosmological models↗
DOE OSTI2025

Holographic Constraints on the String Landscape

We show that holography imposes strong and general constraints on scalar field potentials in the string landscape, determined by the asymptotic structure of the underlying spacetime. Applying these holographic consistency conditions, we identify broad classes of scalar potentials that are incompatible with a well-defined dual description. These include potentials with extended plateaus, excessively steep or shallow asymptotics, certain zero crossings, and specific alignments of stable AdS minima in moduli space. In particular, making the standard assumption that the CFT dual to a stable AdS vacuum must be realized as a worldvolume theory of a brane in string theory, we show that the brane selects an infinite-distance limit in moduli space where parametric scale separation is forbidden. Furthermore, the steepness and positivity of the potential are restricted in that infinite distance direction. We also find that requiring the validity of the effective theory in the future vacuum, a natural holographic criterion, automatically enforces the Trans-Planckian Censorship Conjecture (TCC) for classical cosmological solutions with positive potentials. Taken together, these constraints exclude the leading proposals to realize scale-separated AdS vacua and metastable de Sitter vacua in the string theory landscape such as DGKT and KKLT.

Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics (astro-ph.C↗
DOE OSTI2025

Nonperturbative quantum gravity in a closed Lorentzian universe

We study how meaningful physical predictions can arise in nonperturbative quantum gravity in a closed Lorentzian universe. In such settings, recent developments suggest that the quantum gravitational Hilbert space is one-dimensional and real for each α-sector, as induced by spacetime wormholes. This appears to obstruct the conventional quantum-mechanical prescription of assigning probabilities via projection onto a basis of states. While previous approaches have introduced external observers or augmented the theory to resolve this issue, we argue that quantum gravity itself contains all the necessary ingredients to make physical predictions. We demonstrate that the emergence of classical observables and probabilistic outcomes can be understood as a consequence of partial observability: physical observers access only a subsystem of the universe. Tracing out the inaccessible degrees of freedom yields reduced density matrices that encode classical information, with uncertainties exponentially suppressed by the environment’s entropy. We develop this perspective using both the Lorentzian path integral and operator formalisms and support it with a simple microscopic model. Our results show that quantum gravity in a closed universe naturally gives rise to meaningful, robust predictions without recourse to external constructs.

AdS-CFT Correspondence↗