Scientific Series

As well known, cosmic ray experiments can put strong constraints on possible Lorentz Invariance Violations. In particular, the presence of the so called GZK \'cut-off\' may indicate that protons do propagate in the Universe as expected from relativistic invariance. The presence of this feature in the spectrum has been convincingly indicated by the HiRes and Auger experiments, while the Auger Observatory has given indication on the correlation of Ultra High Energy Cosmic particles with nearby sources, as predicted by the GZK feature. I review the experimental results and discuss in particular both the theoretical and experimental intricacies and the limits on LIV parameters that can be deduced.

With the aim of proposing feasible, quantum optical realizations of quantum information protocols and minimizing the resource costs in such implementations, we will discuss various, so-called hybrid approaches. These include, for instance, schemes based upon both discrete and continuous quantum variables.

The discovery and understanding of superconductivity has provided important paradigms for physics, including spontaneous gauge symmetry breaking and the Anderson-Higgs mechanism. More recent discoveries in superconductivity have given us examples of doped Mott insulators, still an unsolved theoretical problem, as well as superconductors which spontaneously break time reversal symmetry and which support Majorana fermions and non-Abelian statistics. The latter are of potential interest to quantum computing. This talk will review our current understanding of, and the open issues related to, these new supercondutors, including the high T_c cuprates, iron pnictides, and strontium ruthenate.

Motivated by the analogy proposed by Witten between Chern-Simons theories and CFT-Wess-Zumino-Witten models, we explore a new way of computing the entropy of a black hole starting from the isolated horizon framework in Loop Quantum Gravity. The results seem to indicate that this analogy can work in this particular case. This could be a good starting point for the search of a deeper connection between the description of black holes in LQG and a conformal field theory.

This paper critically examines the view of quantum mechanics that emerged shortly after the introduction of quantum mechanics and that has been widespread ever since. Although N. Bohr, P. A. M. Dirac, and W. Heisenberg advanced this view earlier, it is best exemplified by J. von Neumann’s argument in Mathematical Foundations of Quantum Mechanics (1932) that the transformation of \'a [quantum] state ... under the action of an energy operator . . . is purely causal,\' while, \'on the other hand, the state ... which may measure a [given] quantity ... undergoes in a measurement a non-casual change.\' Accordingly, while the paper discusses all four of these arguments, it will especially focus on that of von Neumann. The paper also offers an alternative, radically noncausal, view of the quantum-mechanical situation and considers the differences between the ensemble and the Bayesian understanding quantum mechanics. It will also discuss the Bayesian approach to quantum information theory in this set of contexts.

We discuss various properties of holographic mesons in a deconfined strongly coupled plasma. We show that such mesons obtain a width from a non-perturbative effect. On the string theory side this is due to open string modes on a D-brane tunneling into a black hole through worldsheet instantons. On the field theory side these instantons have the simple interpretation as heavy thermal quarks. We also comment on how this non-perturbative effect has important consequences for the phase structure of the Yang-Mills theory obtained in the classical gravity limit.

Gravitomagnetism is a subtle concept. Adding Lorentz invariance to Newtonian gravity leads to magnetism, but Einsteinian gravitomagnetism differs from Maxwell\'s electromagnetism. The differences lead to confusion when Lense-Thirring precession is wrongly ascribed to gyroscopes, and when authors disagree about whether lunar laser ranging has measured gravitomagnetism. To clarify these issues, we analyze electric and magnetic effects in local Lorentz frames using the tetrad formalism.

I discuss a class of compact objects (\'monsters\') with more entropy than a black hole of the same ADM mass. Such objects are problematic for AdS/CFT duality and the conventional interpretation of black hole entropy as counting of microstates. Nevertheless, monster initial data can be constructed in semi-classical general relativity without requiring large curvatures or energy densities.

Quantum computation by single-qubit measurements was proposed by Raussendorf and Briegel [PRL 86, 5188] as a potential scheme for implementing quantum computers. It also offers an unusual means of describing unitary transformations. To better understand which measurement-based procedures perform unitary operations, we may consider the following problem: under what circumstances can a measurement-based procedure for a unitary U be found, provided a similar procedure for U which relies on post-selection? In this talk, I describe the so-called \'Measurement Pattern Interpolation\' problem, the intuition behind the solved special cases, and possible applications of a general solution to this problem.

Conventional quantum mechanics answers this question by specifying the required mathematical properties of wavefunctions and invoking the Born postulate. The ontological question remains unanswered. There is one exception to this. A variation of the Feynman chessboard model allows a classical stochastic process to assemble a wavefunction, based solely on the geometry of spacetime paths. A direct comparison of how a related process assembles a Probability Density Function reveals both how and why PDFs and wavefunctions differ from the perspective of an underlying kinetic theory. If the fine-scale motion of a particle through spacetime is continuous and position is a single valued function of time, then we are able to describe ensembles of paths directly by PDFs. However, should paths have time reversed portions so that position is not a single-valued function of time, a simple Bernoulli counting of paths fails, breaking the link to PDF\'s! Under certain circumstances, correcting the path-counting to accommodate time-reversed sections results in wavefunctions not PDFs. The result is that a single `switch\' simultaneously turns on both special relativity and quantum propagation. Physically, fine-scale random motion in space alone yields a diffusive process with PDFs governed by the Telegraph equations. If the fine-scale motion includes both directions in time, the result is a wavefunction satisfying the Dirac equation that also provides a detailed answer to the title question.

It is argued that space-time is discretized on the basis of the gravitational interactions among the degrees of freedom of quantum fields.Configurations of fields fall into 2 classes,propagating (cisplanckian in length scale) and those that are transplanckian, sequestered in the space-time that is localized in discrete elements.Only the former determine the hubble expansion parameter and are therefore used to construct the inflaton.The model used for discretization is Sorkin\'s causet construction.From this the covariant massy Klein Gordon equation can be rationalized.The mass is encoded as an exchange matrix element between the sequestered (bound) degrees of freedom and those that propagate,presumably by tunneling thereby exlaining why m<<1.