Year: 2015
Type: dissertation
Abstract: A deeply-held belief in fundamental physics is that interactions must happen locally. \nDespite the great success of local models, there are many indications that locality must be abandoned in a theory of quantum gravity. \nFor example, this nonlocality may appear as a minimum length or an ultraviolet cutoff at the Planck scale. \n \nBut without a full theory of quantum gravity, can we model the effect that this nonlocality may have on sub-Planckian physics? \nIn this work, we study a model for an ultraviolet cutoff based on Shannon's sampling theorem of classical information theory. \nWe apply the sampling theorem to quantum field theory, which results in the ability to represent fields on a lattice without breaking Euclidean symmetries. \nAfter building up the bandlimited quantum field theory, we study the locality and entanglement of its degrees of freedom. \nWe find that each degree of freedom occupies an incompressible volume of space, on the order of the Planck scale in size.
Source: UWSpace (University of Waterloo)
Author: Jason Pye
Language: English
Subfield: Nuclear and High Energy Physics
Field: Physics and Astronomy
Domain: Physical Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W2243577249