2007/02/01 by Jian-Huang She
Physics and Astronomy · #Astronomy #Astrophysics #Black Holes and Theoretical Physics #Classical mechanics #Cosmological constant #Cosmology #Cosmology and Gravitation Theories #Dark energy #De Sitter universe #Galaxies: Formation, Evolution, Phenomena #Horizon #Inflation (cosmology) #Metric expansion of space #Particle horizon #Physics #String (physics) #Theoretical physics #Universe #hep-th
paper · pdf · doi:10.1088/1475-7516/2007/02/021
published as JCAP 0702:021,2007 · 20 pages, no figures, harvmac
arxiv created 2007/02/01 · openalex publication_date 2007/02/16 · arxiv updated 2010/10/27 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/05
We propose that the existence of the string landscape suggests that the universe can be in a quantum glass state, where an extremely large viscosity is generated, and long distance dynamics slows down. At the same time, the short distance dynamics is not altered due to the separation of timescales. This scenario can help us to understand some controversies in cosmology, for example the natural existence of slow roll inflation and dark energy in the landscape, the apparent smallness of the cosmological constant. We see also that moduli stabilization is no longer necessary. We further identify the glass transition point, where the viscosity diverges, as the location of the cosmic horizon. We try to reconstruct the geometry of the accelerating universe from the structure of the landscape, and find that the metric should have an infinite jump when crossing the horizon. We predict the static coordinate metric for de Sitter space to break down outside the horizon.