Low energy Quantum Gravity from the Effective Average Action

Within the effective average action approach to quantum gravity, we recover the low energy effective action as derived in the effective field theory framework, by studying the flow of possibly non-local form factors that appear in the curvature expansion of the effective average action. We restrict to the one-loop flow where progress can be made with the aid of the non-local heat kernel expansion. We discuss the possible physical implications of the scale dependent low energy effective action through the analysis of the quantum corrections to the Newtonian potential.Comment: 24 pages, 1 figure; minor corrections, references adde

The renormalization of fluctuating branes, the Galileon and asymptotic safety

We consider the renormalization of d-dimensional hypersurfaces (branes) embedded in flat (d+1)-dimensional space. We parametrize the truncated effective action in terms of geometric invariants built from the extrinsic and intrinsic curvatures. We study the renormalization-group running of the couplings and explore the fixed-point structure. We find evidence for an ultraviolet fixed point similar to the one underlying the asymptotic-safety scenario of gravity. We also examine whether the structure of the Galileon theory, which can be reproduced in the nonrelativistic limit, is preserved at the quantum level.Comment: 15 pages, 1 figure; v3: equation 4.2 and consequent equations correcte

Quantum corrections in Galileon theories

We calculate the one-loop quantum corrections in the cubic Galileon theory, using cutoff regularization. We confirm the expected form of the one-loop effective action and that the couplings of the Galileon theory do not get renormalized. However, new terms, not included in the tree-level action, are induced by quantum corrections. We also consider the one-loop corrections in an effective brane theory, which belongs to the Horndeski or generalized Galileon class. We find that new terms are generated by quantum corrections, while the tree-level couplings are also renormalized. We conclude that the structure of the generalized Galileon theories is altered by quantum corrections more radically than that of the Galileon theory.Comment: 8 pages; v2 minor typos corrected, references added; v3 minor clarifications; v4 version published in PR

Large N Quantum Gravity

We obtain the effective action of four dimensional quantum gravity, induced by N massless matter fields, by integrating the RG flow of the relative effective average action. By considering the leading approximation in the large N limit, where one neglects the gravitational contributions with respect to the matter contributions, we show how different aspects of quantum gravity, as asymptotic safety, quantum corrections to the Newtonian potential and the conformal anomaly induced effective action, are all represented by different terms of the effective action when this is expanded in powers of the curvature.Comment: 19 pages, 1 figure, contribution published in "New Journal of Physics Focus Issue on Quantum Einstein Gravity

Marginally Deformed Starobinsky Gravity

We show that quantum-induced marginal deformations of the Starobinsky gravitational action of the form $R^{2(1 -\alpha)}$, with $R$ the Ricci scalar and $\alpha$ a positive parameter, smaller than one half, can account for the recent experimental observations by BICEP2 of primordial tensor modes. We also suggest natural microscopic (non) gravitational sources of these corrections and demonstrate that they lead generally to a nonzero and positive $\alpha$. Furthermore we argue, that within this framework, the tensor modes probe theories of grand unification with a large scalar field content.Comment: 5 pages, 1 figure, 2 column

Multi-critical multi-field models: a CFT approach to the leading order

We present some general results for the multi-critical multi-field models in d>2 recently obtained using CFT and Schwinger-Dyson methods at perturbative level without assuming any symmetry. Results in the leading non trivial order are derived consistently for several conformal data in full agreement with functional perturbative RG methods. Mechanisms like emergent (possibly approximate) symmetries can be naturally investigated in this framework.Comment: 12 pages, 1 figure, Contribution to the Conference QFT2018, Quantum Fields From Fundamental Concepts to Phenomenological Questions, Mainz 26-28 September 201

One-loop effective action in quantum gravitation

We present the formalism of computing one-loop effective action for Quantum Gravitation using non-local heat kernel methods. We found agreement with previous old results. In main part of my presentation I considered the system of E-H gravitation and scalar fields. We were able to derive non-local quantum effective action up to the second order in heat kernel generalized curvatures. By going to flat spacetime expressions for gravitational form factors are possible to construct and compare with the results from effective field theory for gravity

Critical exponents of O(N) models in fractional dimensions

We compute critical exponents of O(N) models in fractal dimensions between two and four, and for continuos values of the number of field components N, in this way completing the RG classification of universality classes for these models. In d=2 the N-dependence of the correlation length critical exponent gives us the last piece of information needed to establish a RG derivation of the Mermin-Wagner theorem. We also report critical exponents for multi-critical universality classes in the cases N>1 and N=0. Finally, in the large-N limit our critical exponents correctly approach those of the spherical model, allowing us to set N~100 as threshold for the quantitative validity of leading order large-N estimates.Comment: 6 pages, 5 figures, reference adde

Scaling Solutions in Continuous Dimension

We study scaling solutions of the RG flow equation for the Z_2-effective potential in continuous dimension. As the dimension is lowered from d=4 we first observe the appearance of the Ising scaling solution and successively the apparence of multi-critical scaling solutions of arbitrary order. Approaching d=2 these multi-critical scaling solutions converge to the unitary minimal models found in CFT.Comment: 5 pages, 5 figures, published versio