One-loop quantum gravitational corrections to the scalar two-point function at fixed geodesic distance

Abstract

We study a proposal for gauge-invariant correlation functions in perturbative quantum gravity, which are obtained by fixing the geodesic distance between points in the fluctuating geometry. These correlation functions are non-local and strongly divergent, and we show how to renormalise them by performing a "wave function renormalisation" of the geodesic embedding coordinates. The result is finite and gauge-independent, but displays unusual features such as double logarithms at one-loop order.