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The general boundary state formulation is a key tool for extracting the semiclassical limit of nonpertubative theories of quantum gravity. In this talk I will discuss how this formalism works in the context of four-dimensional quantum Regge calculus with a general triangulation. A Gaussian boundary state selects a classical internal solution and peaks the path integral on it. As a result boundary observables, in particular the two-point function, can be computed order by order in a semiclassical asymptotic expansion. When the same methods are applied to a modified Regge theory that substitutes the exponential of the action by its cosine at each simplex in the triangulation, as conjectured from the semiclassical limit of spin foam models, the contributions from the sign-reversed terms are suppressed and the results match those of conventional Regge calculus. This talk is based on the results published in arXiv:0808.1107 [gr-qc].

I would like to provide a short, possibly elementary, introduction to the problem of computing string amplitudes at higher genus for superstrings. Essentially, I will recall which is the mathematical problem in defining the path integral measure (which has a well defined algebraic geometry realization for bosonic strings) and the solution proposed by d~@~YHocker and Phong for the genus 2 case. Their main results are the chiral splitted form of the measure, and its explicit expression in genus two. They proposed the splitting form to work at any genus and assumed some restriction for the explicit form which however did not permitted them to find a solution for genera higher then 2. I will tell something about the technology which permitted us to find explicit solutions for genus 3 and four. Indeed, we showed that the restrictions imposed by d~@~YHocker and Phong have no solution whereas the most general form compatible with modular invariance and clustering provide a unique solution, at least for genus 3 and 4. I will try to be as less technical as possible.

This course is aimed at advanced undergraduate and beginning graduate students, and is inspired by a book by the same title, written by Padmanabhan. Each session consists of solving one or two pre-determined problems, which is done by a randomly picked student. While the problems introduce various subjects in Astrophysics and Cosmology, they do not serve as replacement for standard courses in these subjects, and are rather aimed at educating students with hands-on analytic/numerical skills to attack new problems.

This course is aimed at advanced undergraduate and beginning graduate students, and is inspired by a book by the same title, written by Padmanabhan. Each session consists of solving one or two pre-determined problems, which is done by a randomly picked student. While the problems introduce various subjects in Astrophysics and Cosmology, they do not serve as replacement for standard courses in these subjects, and are rather aimed at educating students with hands-on analytic/numerical skills to attack new problems.

In this talk I will give an introduction to the simulation of quantum many-body systems using the so-called tensor networks. After a brief historical review, I will introduce the basics on tensor network representations of quantum states, and will explain some recent developments. In particular, in the last part of my talk I will focus on recent results obtained in the simulation of 2-dimensional quantum lattice systems of infinite size.

The South Pole Telescope (SPT) is a 10-meter submm-wave telescope optimized for large-field imaging of the cosmic microwave background (CMB) at arcminute resolution. The first key project of the SPT is a large area survey to find galaxy clusters using the Sunyaev-Zel\'dovich effect. Combined with optically determined redshifts, the survey yields will be used to place constraints on the nature of dark energy, via its effect on the growth of clusters and the geometry of the universe. Working toward this goal, the SPT has surveyed two 100 square degree fields at high sensitivity. This talk will review the status of the SPT, present some of the first SZ results, and discuss future science with this instrument.

The standard Hamiltonian formulation of (first order) gravity breaks manifest covariance both in its retention of the Lorentz group as a local gauge group and in its discrepant treatment of spacelike and timelike diffeomorphisms. Here we promote more covariant alternatives for canonical quantum gravity that address each of these problems, and discuss the implications for both the classical and the quantum theory of gravity. By retaining the full local Lorentz group, one gains significant insight into the geometric and algebraic properties of the Hamiltonian dynamics. As an example, we discuss the possibility of computing the internal spin angular momentum of asymptotically flat spacetimes, which may lead to insight into the nature of spin in quantum gravity. By treating the spacelike and timelike diffeomorphisms on equal footing, using techniques from geometric quantization we find a new representation of the quantum constraints where the total Hamiltonian is kinematical in the same vein as the Gauss and diffeomorphism constraints. Finally, we discuss the possibility of a manifestly 4-dimensional symplectic form on the Lagrangian phase space.