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Exotic spaces and quantum gravity

 

作者: Kristin Schleich,   Donald M. Witt,  

 

期刊: AIP Conference Proceedings  (AIP Available online 1999)
卷期: Volume 493, issue 1  

页码: 233-237

 

ISSN:0094-243X

 

年代: 1999

 

DOI:10.1063/1.1301590

 

出版商: AIP

 

数据来源: AIP

 

摘要:

It is well known that in four or more dimensions, there exist exotic manifolds; manifolds that are homeomorphic but not diffeomorphic to each other. This is in contrast to the uniqueness of the differentiable structure on manifolds in one, two and three dimensions. As exotic manifolds are not diffeomorphic, one can argue that functional integrals for gravity should include a sum over not only physically distinct geometries and topologies but also inequivalent differentiable structures. But can the inclusion of exotic manifolds in such sums make a significant contribution to these quantum amplitudes? In a word, yes. Simply connected exotic Einstein manifolds with positive curvature exist in seven dimensions. Their metrics are found numerically; they are shown to have volumes of the same order of magnitude. Their contribution to the semiclassical evaluation of the partition function for Euclidean quantum gravity in seven dimensions is evaluated and found to be nontrivial. Consequently, inequivalent differentiable structures should be included in the formulation of sums over histories for quantum gravity. ©1999 American Institute of Physics.

 

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