The problem of time is one of the most relevant open issues in canonical quantum gravity. Although there is a huge literature about this topic, a commonly accepted solution has not been found yet. Here, we focus on the semiclassical approach to the problem of time, that has the main goal of reproducing quantum field theory on a fixed Wentzel-Kramers-Brillouin (WKB) background accounting also for quantum gravity corrections. We analyze the different choices of the expansion parameter and discuss the problems arising in previous proposals, where a nonunitary evolution emerges as an effect of quantum gravity corrections. In this work, we develop a new approach to solve this problem by performing the WKB expansion with the introduction of the so-called kinematical action as a clock for quantum matter, that allows to recover a unitary dynamics.

We analyze the effect induced on standard quantum field theory (in a functional approach) by quantum gravity corrections to a pure classical background. In the framework of the Kuchař and Torre proposal for a gravity-matter theory constrained to a Gaussian reference frame, materialized as a fluid in the system evolution, we consider a Born-Oppenheimer separation of the system, regarding the gravity degrees of freedom as the slow varying component and the matter plus the Gaussian fluid as fast quantum coordinates. The slow gravity component obeys the Wheeler-DeWitt equation, and we consider a Wentzel-Kramer-Brillouin expansion of its quantum dynamics via a Planckian parameter. The main issue of the proposed scenario is that, on one hand, we recover a modified quantum field theory in the presence of a Hermitian Hamiltonian (not affected by nonunitarity as in other approaches) and, on the other hand, we get the Gaussian fluid as a physical clock for such an amended quantum theory (verifying the correct energy conditions). We also show its equivalence with the kinematical action method, used in a previous work, in the homogeneous setting. Then, we implement the proposed paradigm to describe the dynamics of a homogeneous free massless scalar field, living on an isotropic universe, in the presence of a cosmological constant. We completely solve the dynamics up to the first order correction in the Planckian parameter to the standard quantum field theory. We determine the explicit form of the modified scalar field wave function, due to quantum features of the cosmic scale factor evolution. Phenomenological considerations and discussions are provided.

In this review, we analyse different aspects concerning the possibility to separate a gravity-matter system into a part which lives close to a quasi-classical state and a “small” quantum subset. The considered approaches are all relying on a WKB expansion of the dynamics by an order parameter and the natural arena consists of the Bianchi universe minisuperspace. We first discuss how, limiting the WKB expansion to the first order of approximation, it is possible to recover for the quantum subsystem a Schrödinger equation, as written on the classical gravitational background. Then, after having tested the validity of the approximation scheme for the Bianchi I model, we give some applications for the quantum subsystem in the so-called “corner” configuration of the Bianchi IX model. We individualize the quantum variable in the small one of the two anisotropy degrees of freedom. The most surprising result is the possibility to obtain a non-singular Bianchi IX cosmology when the scenario is extrapolated backwards in time. In this respect, we provide some basic hints on the extension of this result to the generic cosmological solution. In the last part of the review, we consider the same scheme to the next order of approximation identifying the quantum subset as made of matter variables only. This way, we are considering the very fundamental problem of non-unitary morphology of the quantum gravity corrections to quantum field theory discussing some proposed reformulations. Instead of constructing the time dependence via that one of the classical gravitational variables on the label time as in previous works, we analyse a recent proposal to construct time by fixing a reference frame. This scheme can be reached both introducing the so-called “kinematical action”, as well as by the well-known Kuchar–Torre formulation. In both cases, the Schrödinger equation, amended for quantum gravity corrections, has the same morphology and we provide a cosmological implementation of the model, to elucidate its possible predictions.

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