Three-dimensional quantum supergravity and supersymmetric spin foam models (Q701897)

The authors consider a superization of the spin foam approach to the quantization of supergravity theories. The quantization procedure that they propose takes advantage of the superfield quantization. Passage from fields to superfields and from gauge group to gauge supergroup allows to mimic the quantization formalism of conventional gravity. The main focus in the paper is on the three-dimensional gravity. The quantization of supergravity is obtained by means of the circuit diagram formalism, but relation to conventional spin foam formalism is also shown. Moreover the authors also investigate the loop quantization of the above supergravity theory, where a new super-length operator emerges. It is constructed from the super-triad. Important question of the identification of the fermions in the spin foam is addressed using the properties of the representations of an OSp\((1| 2)\). More specifically, the paper contains the supersymmetric generalization of the Ponzano-Regge model obtained using the formulation of three-dimensional supergravity as a topological BF-theory with the OSp\((1| 2)\) as a gauge group. The obtained model is discretization independent. This extensive paper consists of six clearly written sections.