On non-perturbative unitarity in gravitational scattering

Abstract

Abstract We argue that the tree-level graviton-scalar scattering in the Regge limit is unitarized by non-perturbative effects within General Relativity alone, that is without resorting to any extension thereof. At Planckian energy the back reaction of the incoming graviton on the background geometry produces a non-perturbative plane wave which softens the UV-behavior in turn. Our amplitude interpolates between the perturbative graviton-scalar scattering at low energy and scattering on a classical plane wave in the Regge limit that is bounded for all values of s.