| Issue |
EPL
Volume 141, Number 5, March 2023
|
|
|---|---|---|
| Article Number | 59001 | |
| Number of page(s) | 6 | |
| Section | Gravitation, cosmology and astrophysics | |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1209/0295-5075/acbc48 | |
| Published online | 28 February 2023 | |
Quantum resolution of the cosmological singularity without new physics
1 School of Mathematics and Statistics, University of Sheffield - Hicks Building, Hounsfield Road, Sheffield S3 7RH, UK
2 Theoretical Physics Group, The Blackett Laboratory, Imperial College - Prince Consort Rd., London, SW7 2BZ, UK
(a) E-mail: s.c.gielen@sheffield.ac.uk (corresponding author)
(b) E-mail: j.magueijo@imperial.ac.uk
Received: 11 November 2022
Accepted: 15 February 2023
We study a quantum Hot Big Bang in the connection representation, with a matter constant of motion m whose conjugate defines time. Superpositions in m induce a unitary inner product. The wave function reveals a resolution of the singularity problem without new physics or supplementary boundary conditions. Backtracking in time, the probability peak eventually halts at a maximum curvature, its height dropping thereafter while a symmetric contracting peak rises. The Big Bang is replaced by a superposition of contracting and expanding regular Universes. We contrast these findings with the situation in the metric representation, where boundary conditions at the singularity are needed for unitary evolution.
© 2023 The author(s)
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