The Shortest Scale of Quantum Field Theory

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  • 8 September 2000
Abstract
The vacuum of quantum field theories of a large number of fields can be unstable due to strong vacuum energy fluctuations, decaying rapidly into many small black holes. We propose that in stable theories, the number of independent quantum mechanical degrees of freedom in a given volume is therefore bounded. Our bound can be made consistent with entropy bounds and holography, but does not seem to be equivalent to either. Rather than setting a direct limit on the number of elementary particles it prescribes a definition, in terms of the Planck length and the number of species, of the shortest scale of any quantum field theory compatible with gravity.

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