Neural Network Learning and Quantum Gravity

On the long-established classification problems in general relativity we take a novel perspective by adopting fruitful techniques from machine learning and modern data-science. In particular, we model Petrov's classification of spacetimes, and show that a feed-forward neural network can achieve high degree of success. We also show how data visualization techniques with dimensionality reduction can help analyze the underlying patterns in the structure of the different types of...

We review the recent programme of using machine-learning to explore the landscape of mathematical problems. With this paradigm as a model for human intuition - complementary to and in contrast with the more formalistic approach of automated theorem proving - we highlight some experiments on how AI helps with conjecture formulation, pattern recognition and computation.

Understanding the loss landscape is an important problem in machine learning. One key feature of the loss function, common to many neural network architectures, is the presence of exponentially many low lying local minima. Physical systems with similar energy landscapes may provide useful insights. In this work, we point out that black holes naturally give rise to such landscapes, owing to the existence of black hole entropy. For definiteness, we consider 1/8 BPS black holes ...

This is a brief overview on the current status of string theory for non-specialists. The purpose is to give an aspect on the nature of string theory as a unified theory of all interactions including quantum gravity and to discuss future perspectives. Particular emphases are put on the mysteries why string theory contains gravity and why it resolves the ultraviolet problems.

Systematic classification of Z2xZ2 orbifold compactifications of the heterotic-string was pursued by using its free fermion formulation. The method entails random generation of string vacua and analysis of their entire spectra, and led to discovery of spinor-vector duality and three generation exophobic string vacua. The classification was performed for string vacua with unbroken SO(10) GUT symmetry, and progressively extended to models in which the SO(10) symmetry is broken ...

Machine learning has been used in high energy physics for a long time, primarily at the analysis level with supervised classification. Quantum computing was postulated in the early 1980s as way to perform computations that would not be tractable with a classical computer. With the advent of noisy intermediate-scale quantum computing devices, more quantum algorithms are being developed with the aim at exploiting the capacity of the hardware for machine learning applications. A...

We present an approach to cosmology in which the Universe learns its own physical laws. It does so by exploring a landscape of possible laws, which we express as a certain class of matrix models. We discover maps that put each of these matrix models in correspondence with both a gauge/gravity theory and a mathematical model of a learning machine, such as a deep recurrent, cyclic neural network. This establishes a correspondence between each solution of the physical theory and...

We use deep autoencoder neural networks to draw a chart of the heterotic $\mathbb{Z}_6$-II orbifold landscape. Even though the autoencoder is trained without knowing the phenomenological properties of the $\mathbb{Z}_6$-II orbifold models, we are able to identify fertile islands in this chart where phenomenologically promising models cluster. Then, we apply a decision tree to our chart in order to extract the defining properties of the fertile islands. Based on this informati...

We present a numerical computation, based on neural network techniques, of the physical Yukawa couplings in a heterotic string theory compactification on a smooth Calabi-Yau threefold with non-standard embedding. The model belongs to a large class of heterotic line bundle models that have previously been identified and whose low-energy spectrum precisely matches that of the MSSM plus fields uncharged under the Standard Model group. The relevant quantities for the calculation,...

In the canonical approach of loop quantum gravity, arguably the most important outstanding problem is finding and interpreting solutions to the Hamiltonian constraint. In this work, we demonstrate that methods of machine learning are in principle applicable to this problem. We consider U(1) BF theory in 3 dimensions, quantized with loop quantum gravity methods. In particular, we formulate a master constraint corresponding to Hamilton and Gauss constraints using loop quantum g...