Asymptotics of Regulated Field Commutators for Einstein-Rosen Waves

We discuss the asymptotic behavior of regulated field commutators for linearly polarized, cylindrically symmetric gravitational waves and the mathematical techniques needed for this analysis. We concentrate our attention on the effects brought about by the introduction of a physical cut-off in the study of the microcausality of the model and describe how the different physically relevant regimes are affected by its presence. Specifically we discuss how genuine quantum gravity effects can be disentangled from those originating in the introduction of a regulator.Comment: 9 figures, 19 pages in DIN A4 format. Accepted for publication in Journal of Mathematical Physic

An ecomorphological comparative study of extant and Late Holocene Sigmodontinae (Rodentia, Cricetidae) assemblages from central-eastern Argentina

The anthropic effect associated with worldwide European settlements over the last 500 years has caused dramatic environmental changes, modified regional patterns of biodiversity, and often led to local or complete extinctions. The sigmodontine rodents of Bahía Samborombón (Humid Pampas, central-eastern Argentina) constitute a good case study: a late Holocene archaeological site allowed us to compare a pre-European settlement assemblage (12 species) with the extant one (nine species). We used linear morphometrics (16 cranial and ten mandibular measurements) to assess interspecific morphological variations of the masticatory apparatus in relation to dietary habits for each assemblage. Even though sigmodontines have a tendency towards omnivory, groups based on dietary preference only overlapped partially. Size was one of the main variables involved in niche segregation, and shape characteristics such as rostrum elongation or mandible robustness were linked to different diets. We found that a combination of dietary preference and size was associated with extinctions. The main morphospace change between the two assemblages was related to the local extinction of the three greater insectivores and the smallest graminivore, located towards the center of the assemblage’s morphospace. An insectivore was incorporated, involving no significant changes in the general morphospace. Graminivores and larvivores were not affected. Our study sheds light on the causes of local extinctions of small mammals at the Humid Pampas, a phenomenon that had never been studied from an ecomorphological approach.Fil: Barbero, Sofía. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Oficina de Coordinación Administrativa Parque Centenario. Museo Argentino de Ciencias Naturales "Bernardino Rivadavia"; ArgentinaFil: Teta, Pablo Vicente. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Oficina de Coordinación Administrativa Parque Centenario. Museo Argentino de Ciencias Naturales "Bernardino Rivadavia"; ArgentinaFil: Cassini, Guillermo Hernán. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Oficina de Coordinación Administrativa Parque Centenario. Museo Argentino de Ciencias Naturales "Bernardino Rivadavia"; Argentina. Universidad Nacional de Luján. Departamento de Ciencias Básicas; Argentin

The Coupling of Shape Dynamics to Matter

Shape Dynamics (SD) is a theory dynamically equivalent to vacuum General Relativity (GR), which has a different set of symmetries. It trades refoliation invariance, present in GR, for local 3-dimensional conformal invariance. This contribution to the Loops 11 conference addresses one of the more urgent questions regarding the equivalence: is it possible to incorporate normal matter in the new framework? The answer is yes, in certain regimes. We present general criteria for coupling and apply it to a few examples.The outcome presents bounds and conditions on scalar densities (such as the Higgs potential and the cosmological constant) not present in GR.Comment: 4 pages. Contribution to Loops '11 conference in Madrid, to appear in Journal of Physics: Conference Series (JPCS

Quantum Cylindrical Waves and Sigma Models

We analyze cylindrical gravitational waves in vacuo with general polarization and develop a viewpoint complementary to that presented recently by Niedermaier showing that the auxiliary sigma model associated with this family of waves is not renormalizable in the standard perturbative sense.Comment: 11 pages (DIN A4), accepted in International Journal of Modern Physics

Microcausality and quantum cylindrical gravitational waves

We study several issues related to the different choices of time available for the classical and quantum treatment of linearly polarized cylindrical gravitational waves. We pay special attention to the time evolution of creation and annihilation operators and the definition of Fock spaces for the different choices of time involved. We also discuss the issue of microcausality and the use of field commutators to extract information about the causal properties of quantum spacetime. © 2003 The American Physical Society.The authors wish to thank A. Ashtekar, G. Date, and L. Garay for interesting discussions. They are especially grateful to M. Varadarajan for suggesting the subject and sharing enlightening conversations and insight. E.J.S.V. is supported by the Spanish Ministry of Education and Culture co- financed by the European Social Fund. This work was supported by the Spanish MCYT under the research projects BFM2001-0213 and BFM2002-04031-C02-02.Peer Reviewe

Uniqueness of the Fock representation of the Gowdy S1×S2S^1\times S^2 and S3S^3 models

After a suitable gauge fixing, the local gravitational degrees of freedom of the Gowdy $S^1\times S^2$ and $S^3$ cosmologies are encoded in an axisymmetric field on the sphere $S^2$. Recently, it has been shown that a standard field parametrization of these reduced models admits no Fock quantization with a unitary dynamics. This lack of unitarity is surpassed by a convenient redefinition of the field and the choice of an adequate complex structure. The result is a Fock quantization where both the dynamics and the SO(3)-symmetries of the field equations are unitarily implemented. The present work proves that this Fock representation is in fact unique inasmuch as, up to equivalence, there exists no other possible choice of SO(3)-invariant complex structure leading to a unitary implementation of the time evolution.Comment: 10 pages, minor changes, version accepted for publication in Classical and Quantum Gravit

Influencias de los ciudadanos sobre los políticos y los medios de comunicación

El tema de esta ponencia es la influencia de los ciudadanos, desde sus propias perspectivas, sobre los políticos y los medios de comunicación. Las regularidades presentadas se originan en un conjunto de encuestas realizadas en el periodo 2012 y 2014 sobre una muestra de los habitantes adultos y jóvenes de la ciudad de La Plata. La indagación es realizada por el Centro de Investigación y Capacitación en Opinión Pública (CICEOP) en torno a la comunicación política y los estereotipos sociales. Esto implica relacionar a los políticos, los periodistas y la opinión pública en un espacio de interacción discursiva contradictoria; los estereotipos sociales que interesan surgen de esa interacción e involucran a un imaginario que la sustenta. Así, aquí se caracterizará al conjunto de representaciones respecto a la influencia que consideran ejercer los entrevistados sobre los medios y los políticos. Antes de presentar ese conjunto de representaciones, se desarrollará de manera más extensa el concepto de comunicación política.Eje temático: Comunicación/ciencias sociales y subjetividades contemporáneasFacultad de Periodismo y Comunicación Socia

Influencias de los ciudadanos sobre los políticos y los medios de comunicación

El tema de esta ponencia es la influencia de los ciudadanos, desde sus propias perspectivas, sobre los políticos y los medios de comunicación. Las regularidades presentadas se originan en un conjunto de encuestas realizadas en el periodo 2012 y 2014 sobre una muestra de los habitantes adultos y jóvenes de la ciudad de La Plata. La indagación es realizada por el Centro de Investigación y Capacitación en Opinión Pública (CICEOP) en torno a la comunicación política y los estereotipos sociales. Esto implica relacionar a los políticos, los periodistas y la opinión pública en un espacio de interacción discursiva contradictoria; los estereotipos sociales que interesan surgen de esa interacción e involucran a un imaginario que la sustenta. Así, aquí se caracterizará al conjunto de representaciones respecto a la influencia que consideran ejercer los entrevistados sobre los medios y los políticos. Antes de presentar ese conjunto de representaciones, se desarrollará de manera más extensa el concepto de comunicación política.Eje temático: Comunicación/ciencias sociales y subjetividades contemporáneasFacultad de Periodismo y Comunicación Socia