Spacetime Dimension from a Variational Principle

Authors

D. Hochberg
James Thomas Wheeler, Utah State UniversityFollow

Document Type

Article

Journal/Book Title/Conference

Physics Review D

Volume

43

Issue

8

Publication Date

4-15-1991

First Page

2617

Last Page

2621

Abstract

We consider spacetime as having an a priori arbitrary, possibly fractional dimension p>0 and propose a new variational principle for actions defined on p-dimensional spaces. Demanding that the action be stationary with respect to variations in p leads to a constraint equation whose solution yields an explicit determination of the dimension at the classical level. We illustrate these concepts by analyzing a model which reduces to free scalar field theory when p is any positive integer.

Comments

Published by American Physical Society in Physical Review D. Publisher PDF is available for download through link above.

Recommended Citation

Hochberg, D. and Wheeler, J. T., and , Spacetime dimension from a variational principle,Phys. Rev. D43 (1991) 2617 - 2621. http://prola.aps.org/abstract/PRD/v43/i8/p2617_1