Abhay Vasant Ashtekar, Committee Chair/Co-Chair Martin Bojowald, Committee Member Stephon H S Alexander, Committee Member Victor Nistor, Committee Member
In this thesis we present a detailed
introduction to loop quantum cosmology
focusing on the Robertson-Walker cosmologies
with constant spatial curvature. The construction
of the quantum theory will be presented starting
from the classical reduction of the action and will
not require prior knowledge of the loop quantum gravity. Particular attention
will be paid to the detailed inputs and ambiguities
of the quantization and the resulting consequences.
We will uncover features of the theory that appear
unphysical and propose a new quantization as well as
interpretation of the theory that can solve
these problems.
