The path to quantum gravity with causal sets

Yasaman Yazdi is a Research Ireland Pathway awardee and postdoctoral fellow at the Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies. She obtained her PhD from the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics and the University of Waterloo in 2017. She has also held an Avadh Bhatia Fellowship at the University of Alberta, an Imperial College Research Fellowship, a Leverhulme Trust grant and an Emmy Noether Fellowship at the Perimeter Institute. Her research is on the fundamental nature of quantum gravity, as well as its applications. She works on the causal set theory approach to quantum gravity, and in particular, topics including quantum field theory, entanglement entropy, the Everpresent Λ dark energy model, and Lorentzian spectral geometry.

Dr Luca Bombelli is a theoretical physicist specialising in gravitational theory and mathematical physics. He earned his PhD from Syracuse University and held various temporary appointments including postdoctoral research positions at the University of Vienna, the University of Calgary and the Université Libre de Bruxelles before joining the faculty at the University of Mississippi, where he is currently Professor of Physics and Astronomy.

Dr Bombelli has worked on the physics of black holes, particle and wave propagation in curved spacetimes including black holes and expanding universe models, and the canonical formulation of general relativity and its quantization in the loop quantum gravity approach. His current research centres on the causal set approach to spacetime structure and quantum gravity.

Joshua Jones is a 3rd year PhD student at the Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies, supervised by Yasaman Yazdi. He did his undergraduate studies at Imperial College London, and a masters at the University of Cambridge. His interests are largely focused on entropy, black hole thermodynamics, and causal set theory. In particular, he studies entanglement entropy in the causal set as a potential source of the Bekenstein-Hawking entropy, championing a spacetime approach to the calculation such that one can regularise covariantly.

I am a postdoctoral researcher at the International School for Advanced Studies in Trieste, Italy. I began working on causal set theory during my master’s thesis and continued to develop this line of research throughout my PhD at Imperial College London, with a particular focus on quantum field theory on causal sets.

My current research interests also include the effective field theory of gravity and environmental effects in compact binaries, exploring how surrounding media can influence gravitational dynamics and observables.

Arad Nasiri is a postdoctoral fellow at the University of New Brunswick where his research lies at the intersection of quantum gravity and cosmology. He completed his PhD at Imperial College London under the supervision of Professor Fay Dowker. His thesis, titled Stochastic Dark Sector, explored the interplay between ideas from quantum gravity and stochastic behaviour in dark matter and dark energy, as well as the phenomenological implications of causal sets in cosmology. As a postdoctoral fellow, his current interests span a range of topics, including the time-depended functional renormalisation group in the early universe, the quantum-to-classical transition via decoherence in cosmology, and the application of generative diffusion models in downscaling and weather forecasting in Atlantic Canada.

Nosiphiwo Zwane is a lecturer at the University of Eswatini and a founding member of the Eswatini Young Academy. With over eight years of academic experience, she bridges fundamental physics and complex systems. She is also coordinator for the University Physics Society, she is dedicated to fostering STEM engagement and mentoring the next generation of African physicists. Her research interest focuses on Causal Set Theory, a discrete approach to quantum gravity that replaces the space-time continuum with a partially ordered set of elementary events. She is interested in investigation involves identifying observational signatures of quantum gravity, such as the potential "swerving" or diffusion of high-energy cosmic rays as they travel through a discrete vacuum. She also interested in cosmological tests for alternative dark energy models, specifically the Ever-present Lambda (Λ), where the cosmological constant fluctuates based on the volume of the past.