Sussex Research Online: No conditions. Results ordered -Date Deposited. 2023-11-25T05:28:44Z EPrints https://sro.sussex.ac.uk/images/sitelogo.png http://sro.sussex.ac.uk/ 2014-10-29T07:04:37Z 2015-09-25T13:51:30Z http://sro.sussex.ac.uk/id/eprint/50763 This item is in the repository with the URL: http://sro.sussex.ac.uk/id/eprint/50763 2014-10-29T07:04:37Z Aspects of gravity in quantum field theory

This thesis studies three aspects of gravity in quantum field theory. First quantum gravity effects are investigated using effective field theory techniques. In particular, we consider quantum gravity effects in grand unified theory and study their effects on the unification of the masses in such models. We find that the fermion masses unification conditions receive a sizeable correction from the quantum gravitational effects and one thus cannot predict the high energy unification only by the extrapolation from low energy physics without the understanding of gravitational effect in high energy. Secondly we study quantum field theory in curved spacetime in order to understand further about some of the properties of gravity. Keeping gravity as background field we discuss modified gravity theories in different set of parameters called frames; they are the Jordan frame and the Einstein frame respectively. We show how to map gravitational theories at the quantum field theoretical level. The key observation is that there is a non-trivial Jacobian. It can be interpreted as boundary term. Finally we investigate a new canonical quantisation paradigm. In that framework, quantum gravity is power counting renormalisable. Furthermore, the theory is unitary and the problem of time is solved. We use this framework to calculate the solution for the quantum wave function and the semiclassical Hamilton-Jacob function. We study the Hawking-Bekenstein entropy in the spherical symmetric mini-superspace for Schwarzschild black hole, and find that it can be produced naturally from first principles. Importantly it is accompanied naturally by non-thermal quantum correction terms which is generally believed to restore the information loss.

Ting-Cheng Yang 257132
2012-02-20T16:56:10Z 2019-07-02T21:46:25Z http://sro.sussex.ac.uk/id/eprint/37180 This item is in the repository with the URL: http://sro.sussex.ac.uk/id/eprint/37180 2012-02-20T16:56:10Z Gravitational corrections to fermion masses in grand unified theories

We reconsider quantum gravitational threshold effects to the unification of fermion masses in Grand Unified Theories. We show that the running of the Planck mass can have a sizable effect on these thresholds which are thus much more important than naively expected. These corrections make any extrapolation from low energy measurements challenging.

Xavier Calmet 242816 Ting-Cheng Yang 257132