Asymptotic safety in higher-derivative gravity

Abstract

We study the non-perturbative renormalization group flow of higher-derivative gravity employing functional renormalization group techniques. The non-perturbative contributions to the $β$-functions shift the known perturbative ultraviolet fixed point into a non-trivial fixed point with three UV-attractive and one UV-repulsive eigendirections, consistent with the asymptotic safety conjecture of gravity. The implication of this transition on the unitarity problem, typically haunting higher-derivative gravity theories, is discussed.

8 pages; 1 figure; revised version