Higher derivatives and renormalization in quantum cosmology

In the framework of the canonical quantization of general relativity, quantum field theory on a fixed background formally arises in an expansion in powers of the Planck length. In order to renormalize the theory, quadratic terms in the curvature must be included in the gravitational action from the beginning. These terms contain higher derivatives which change completely the Hamiltonian structure of the theory, not making clear the relation between the renormalized theory and the original one. We show that it is possible to avoid this problem. We replace the higher-derivative theory by a second-order one. The classical solutions of the latter are also solutions of the former. We quantize the theory, renormalize the infinities, and show that there is a smooth limit between the classical and the renormalized theories. We work in a Robertson-Walker minisuperspace with a quantum scalar field.