de Sitter Harmonies: Cosmological Spacetimes as Resonances

TL;DR

This paper explores the idea that de Sitter space can be understood as a resonance in a scattering process, using constrained instantons to illustrate the concept and analyze transition amplitudes.

Contribution

It provides a detailed calculation supporting the conjecture that de Sitter space acts as a resonance, advancing the theoretical understanding of its role in quantum cosmology.

Findings

De Sitter space can be modeled as a resonance in scattering processes.

Transition amplitudes exhibit resonant poles indicating metastable states.

Constrained instantons effectively illustrate the resonance behavior.

Abstract

The aim of this work is to provided the details of a calculation summarized in the recent paper by Maltz and Susskind which conjectured a potentially rigorous framework where the status of de Sitter space is the same as that of a resonance in a scattering process. The conjecture being that transition amplitudes between certain states with asymptotically supersymmetric flat vacua contain resonant poles characteristic metastable intermediate states. A calculation employing constrained instantons is presented that illustrates this idea.