Effects related to spacetime foam in particle physics

TL;DR

This paper explores how spacetime foam influences particle physics, suggesting it causes the number of fundamental fields to vary and may contribute to dark matter, with potential observable effects.

Contribution

It introduces a framework for a variable number of quantum fields due to spacetime foam and discusses its implications for dark matter and observable phenomena.

Findings

Spacetime foam leads to a variable number of quantum bosonic fields.

The ground state has a non-zero particle density, potentially explaining dark matter.

Possible measurement of quantum fluctuations in field potentials.

Abstract

It is found that the existence of spacetime foam leads to a situation in which the number of fundamental quantum bosonic fields is a variable quantity. The general aspects of an exact theory that allows for a variable number of fields are discussed, and the simplest observable effects generated by the foam are estimated. It is shown that in the absence of processes related to variations in the topology of space, the concept of an effective field can be reintroduced and standard field theory can be restored. However, in the complete theory the ground state is characterized by a nonvanishing particle number density. From the effective-field standpoint, such particles are "dark". It is assumed that they comprise dark matter of the universe. The properties of this dark matter are discussed, and so is the possibility of measuring the quantum fluctuation in the field potentials.