The main argument generally given for working on string theory is that it’s the only way to get a finite theory of quantum gravity. One often hears claims that gravity can’t be quantized using QFT, that string theory is needed to “smooth out the violent space-time fluctuations at the Planck scale”, or some such explanation for the inherent non-renormalizability of quantum field theories of gravity. From the earliest days of their study, it was hoped that supergravity theories would have better renormalizability properties, with the maximally extended supergravity, N=8 supergravity, the most likely to be well-behaved.<\/p>\n
For years the general belief has been that N=8 supergravity is non-renormalizable, based on the existence of possible counterterms at high enough order. The problem has always been that calculating the coefficients of these counterterms is too difficult, so one cannot be sure that one would not get zero if one actually did the calculation. Last year I wrote here<\/a> about a talk by Zvi Bern in which he mentioned that twistor space methods for doing these kind of calculations were giving indications that these coefficients might be zero. Tonight there’s a new paper<\/a> out by Green, Russo and Vanhove suggesting the same thing. Their arguments involve M-theory and consistency conditions relating supergravity and the low energy limit of 10-d superstring theory.<\/p>\n It would be quite remarkable if it turns out that this work by Michael Green, using string theory and M-theory techniques, ends up shooting down the main argument for why one has to abandon QFT if one wants to do quantum gravity.<\/p>\n Update<\/strong>: Next month at UCLA there will be an entire workshop devoted to this question, entitled Is N=8 Supergravity Finite?<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The main argument generally given for working on string theory is that it’s the only way to get a finite theory of quantum gravity. One often hears claims that gravity can’t be quantized using QFT, that string theory is needed … Continue reading