2011/06/01 by Giovanni Amelino-Camelia, Laurent Freidel, Jerzy Kowalski-Glikman +1 · 1 citation
Physics and Astronomy · #hep-th
paper · pdf · doi:10.1007/s10714-011-1212-8
8 pages, Latex; this essay was awarded Second Prize in the 2011 Essay Competition of the Gravity Research Foundation
arxiv created 2011/06/01 · arxiv updated 2015/05/28
We describe a recently introduced principle of relative locality which we propose governs a regime of quantum gravitational phenomena accessible to experimental investigation. This regime comprises phenomena in which ℏ and GN may be neglected, while their ratio, the Planck mass Mp =√(ℏ / GN), is important. We propose that Mp governs the scale at which momentum space may have a curved geometry. We find that there are striking consequences for the concept of locality. The description of events in spacetime now depends on the energy used to probe it. But there remains an invariant description of physics in phase space. There is furthermore a reasonable expectation that the geometry of momentum space can be measured experimentally using astrophysical observations.