Renormalizability of Massive Gravity in Three Dimensions

In this paper we study perturbatively an extension of the Stelle higher derivative gravity involving an infinite number of derivative terms. We know that the usual quadratic action is renormalizable but suffers of the unitarity problem because of the presence of a ghost (state of negative norm) in the theory. The new theory is instead ghost-free since the introduction of (in general) two entire functions in the model with the property do not introduce new poles in the propaga...

We propose and study a new action for three-dimensional massive gravity. This action takes a very simple form when written in terms of connection and triad variables, but the connection can also be integrated out to obtain a triad formulation. The quadratic action for the perturbations around a Minkowski background reproduces the action of self-dual massive gravity, in agreement with the expectation that the theory propagates a massive graviton. We confirm this result at the ...

The addition of a topologically massive term to an admittedly non-unitary three-dimensional massive model, be it an electromagnetic system or a gravitational one, does not cure its non-unitarity. What about the enlargement of avowedly unitary massive models by way of a topologically massive term? The electromagnetic models remain unitary after the topological augmentation but, surprisingly enough, the gravitational ones have their unitarity spoiled. Here we analyze these issu...

In this paper we will consider the most general quadratic curvature action with infinitely many covariant derivatives of massless gravity in three spacetime dimensions. The action is parity invariant and torsion-free and contains the same off-shell degrees of freedom as the Einstein-Hilbert action in general relativity. In the ultraviolet, with an appropriate choice of the propagator given by the exponential of an entire function, the point-like curvature singularity can be s...

We review some features of three-dimensional (3D) massive gravity theories. In particular, we stress the role of the Schouten tensor, explore an analogy with Lovelock gravity and discuss renormalizabilty.

We propose a new program to quantize and renormalize gravity based on recent progress on the analysis of large random tensors. We compare it briefly with other existing approaches.

A suggestion is made for quantizing gravity perturbatively, and is illustrated for the example of a massive scalar field with gravity.

In this paper we investigate possible consistent ghost-free models containing massive spin 2 particles in three dimensions. We work in a constructive approach based on the frame-like gauge invariant description for such massive spin 2 particles. We provide the most general form of linear approximations, i.e. cubic vertices in the Lagrangian and linear in fields corrections to gauge transformations. As for the possibility to go beyond the linear approximation, we show that the...

In this thesis massive higher derivative gravity theories are analyzed in some detail. One-particle scattering amplitude between two covariantly conserved sources mediated by a graviton exchange is found at tree-level in $D$ dimensional (Anti)-de Sitter and flat spacetimes for the most general quadratic curvature theory augmented with the Pauli-Fierz mass term. From the amplitude expression, the Newtonian potential energies are calculated for various cases. Also, from this am...

In this paper we introduce a perturbatively super-renormalizable and unitary theory of quantum gravity in any dimension D. The theory presents two entire functions, a.k.a. "form factors", and a finite number of local operators required by the quantum consistency of the theory itself. The main reason to introduce the entire functions is to avoid ghosts (states of negative norm) like the one in the four-dimensional Stelle's theory. The new theory is indeed ghost-free since the ...