Microcausality in curved space-time

Sergei Dubovsky, Alberto Nicolis, Enrico Trincherini, Giovanni Villadoro

    Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

    Abstract

    It is well known that in Lorentz-invariant quantum field theories in flat space the commutator of spacelike separated local operators vanishes (microcausality). We provide two different arguments showing that this is a consequence of the causal structure of the classical theory, rather than of Lorentz invariance. In particular, microcausality holds in arbitrary curved space-times, where Lorentz invariance is explicitly broken by the background metric. As illustrated by an explicit calculation on a cylinder this property is rather nontrivial at the level of Feynman diagrams.

    Original languageEnglish (US)
    Article number084016
    JournalPhysical Review D - Particles, Fields, Gravitation and Cosmology
    Volume77
    Issue number8
    DOIs
    StatePublished - Apr 17 2008

    ASJC Scopus subject areas

    • Nuclear and High Energy Physics
    • Physics and Astronomy (miscellaneous)

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