The emergence of Einstein gravity from topological supergravity in 3 + 1D

Event Date:
2025-05-20T13:30:00
2025-05-20T14:30:00
Event Location:
HENN 318
Speaker:
Dr. Tianyao Fang (CUHK, Hong Kong)
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Intended Audience:
Everyone
Local Contact:

Mark Van Raamsdonk (mav@phas.ubc.ca)

All are welcome to attend this talk!

Event Information:

Abstract

The topological aspects of Einstein gravity suggest that topological invariance could be a more profound principle in understanding quantum gravity. In this report, I will begin by considering a topological super-gravity action (N=1) that initially describes a universe without Riemann curvature, which seems trivial. However, after introducing a small deformation parameter λ, which can be regarded as an AdS generalization of supersymmetry (SUSY), we find that the deformed topological quantum field theory (TQFT) becomes unstable at low energy, resulting in the emergence of a classical metric, whose dynamics are controlled by the Einstein equation. Moreover, such type of TQFT can be generalized to include arbitrary N supercharge, enhancing the reliability of our saddle point calculations.

Bio:

Tianyao is a postdoctoral fellow at the Chinese University of Hong Kong Department of Physics.

Learn More:

  • Read Tianyao's paper, "The emergence of Einstein gravity from topological supergravity in 3 + 1D": 2312.17196
Add to Calendar 2025-05-20T13:30:00 2025-05-20T14:30:00 The emergence of Einstein gravity from topological supergravity in 3 + 1D Event Information: Abstract:  The topological aspects of Einstein gravity suggest that topological invariance could be a more profound principle in understanding quantum gravity. In this report, I will begin by considering a topological super-gravity action (N=1) that initially describes a universe without Riemann curvature, which seems trivial. However, after introducing a small deformation parameter λ, which can be regarded as an AdS generalization of supersymmetry (SUSY), we find that the deformed topological quantum field theory (TQFT) becomes unstable at low energy, resulting in the emergence of a classical metric, whose dynamics are controlled by the Einstein equation. Moreover, such type of TQFT can be generalized to include arbitrary N supercharge, enhancing the reliability of our saddle point calculations. Bio: Tianyao is a postdoctoral fellow at the Chinese University of Hong Kong Department of Physics. Learn More: Read Tianyao's paper, "The emergence of Einstein gravity from topological supergravity in 3 + 1D": 2312.17196 Event Location: HENN 318