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Title:
Low-dimensional de Sitter quantum gravity and random matrix theory

Speaker:
Jordan Cotler

Abstract:
I will discuss Jackiw-Teitelboim (JT) quantum gravity in 2D nearly de Sitter (dS) spacetime, as well as pure de Sitter quantum gravity in 3D. These are each theories of boundary modes, which include a reparameterization field on each connected component of the boundary as well as topological degrees of freedom. In 2D, the boundary theory is closely related to the Schwarzian path integral, and in 3D to the quantization of coadjoint orbits of the Virasoro group. In the 2D JT setting, I will define a genus expansion by summing over higher genus generalizations of surfaces used in the Hartle-Hawking construction. Assuming a conjecture regarding the volumes of moduli spaces of such surfaces, the de Sitter genus expansion is the continuation of the recently discovered AdS genus expansion. Then both may be understood as coming from the genus expansion of the same double-scaled random matrix model, which would provide a non-perturbative completion of de Sitter JT gravity.

Link:
http://scgp.stonybrook.edu/video_portal/video.php?id=4283

Workshop:
Simons- Workshop: Applications of Random Matrix Theory to many-body physics