Higher Spin Resolution of a Toy Big Bang

TL;DR

This paper explores how higher spin gauge symmetries in three-dimensional de Sitter space can resolve cosmological singularities through gauge transformations in SL(3,C) Chern-Simons theory, independent of dual CFT considerations.

Contribution

It demonstrates that higher spin gauge transformations can de-singularize dS_3 quotient singularities, providing a novel resolution mechanism within the higher spin gravity framework.

Findings

Singularities in dS_3 can be resolved by higher spin gauge transformations.

Holonomies are key invariants in characterizing solutions.

Higher spin resolution does not depend on dual CFT definitions.

Abstract

Diffeomorphisms preserve spacetime singularities, whereas higher spin symmetries need not. Since three dimensional de Sitter space has quotients that have big-bang/big-crunch singularities and since dS_3-gravity can be written as an SL(2,C) Chern-Simons theory, we investigate SL(3,C) Chern-Simons theory as a higher-spin context in which these singularities might get resolved. As in the case of higher spin black holes in AdS_3, the solutions are invariantly characterized by their holonomies. We show that the dS_3 quotient singularity can be de-singularized by an SL(3,C) gauge transformation that preserves the holonomy: this is a higher spin resolution the cosmological singularity. Our work deals exclusively with the bulk theory, and is independent of the subtleties involved in defining a CFT_2 dual to dS_3 in the sense of dS/CFT.