Limits to Quantum Gravity Effects on Energy Dependence of the Speed of Light from Observations of TeV Flares in Active Galaxies

1998/10/13 by S. D. Biller, A. C. Breslin, J. H. Buckley +29 · 5 citations
Physics and Astronomy · #Black Holes and Theoretical Physics #Cosmology and Gravitation Theories #Noncommutative and Quantum Gravity Theories #astro-ph #gr-qc #hep-ph #hep-th

paper · pdf · doi:10.1103/physrevlett.83.2108

published as Phys.Rev.Lett.83:2108-2111,1999 · 6 pages, including 2 figures

arxiv created 1998/10/13 · openalex publication_date 1999/09/13 · arxiv updated 2010/11/30 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/01

Abstract

We have used data from a TeV \ensuremathγ-ray flare associated with the active galaxy Markarian 421 to place bounds on the possible energy dependence of the speed of light in the context of an effective quantum gravitational energy scale. Recent theoretical work suggests that such an energy scale could be less than the Planck mass and perhaps as low as 10¹⁶ GeV. The limits derived here indicate this energy scale to be in excess of 6\ifmmode×\else\texttimes\fi10¹⁶ GeV for at least one approach to quantum gravity in the context of D-brane string theory. To the best of our knowledge, this constitutes the first convincing limit on such phenomena in this energy regime.

Citations

• The Large-Sample Distribution of the Likelihood Ratio for Testing Composite Hypotheses
• Nonstandard optics from quantum space-time

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