Simulations of Four-Dimensional Simplicial Quantum Gravity as Dynamical Triangulation

TLDR: In this article, the authors studied simplicial manifolds of spherical topology and found the critical line for the cosmological constant as a function of the gravitational one, separating the phases of opened and closed Universe.

Abstract: Four-Dimensional Simplicial Quantum Gravity is simulated using the dynamical triangulation approach. We studied simplicial manifolds of spherical topology and found the critical line for the cosmological constant as a function of the gravitational one, separating the phases of opened and closed Universe. When the bare cosmological constant approaches this line from above, the four-volume grows: we reached about 5×104 simplexes, which proved to be sufficient for the statistical limit of infinite volume. However, for the genuine continuum theory of gravity, the parameters of the lattice model should be further adjusted to reach the second order phase transition point, where the correlation length grows to infinity. We varied the gravitational constant, and we found the first order phase transition, similar to the one found in three-dimensional model, except in 4D the fluctuations are rather large at the transition point, so that this is close to the second order phase transition. The average curvature in cutoff units is large and positive in one phase (gravity), and small negative in another (antigravity). We studied the fractal geometry of both phases, using the heavy particle propagator to define the geodesic map, as well as with the old approach using the shortest lattice paths. The heavy propagator geodesic appeared to be much smoother, so that the scaling laws were found, corresponding to finite fractal dimensions: D+~2.3 in the gravity phase and D−~4.6 in the antigravity phase. Similar, but somewhat lower numbers were obtained from the heat kernel singularity. The influence of the αR2 terms in 2, 3 and 4 dimensions is discussed.