Background-metric Independent Formulation of 4D Quantum Gravity
  Using the background-metric independence for the traceless mode as well as the conformal mode, 4D quantum gravity is described as a quantum field theory defined on a non-dynamical background-metric. The measure then induces an action with 4 derivatives. So we think that 4-th order gravity is essential and the Einstein-Hilbert term should be treated like a mass term. We introduce the dimensionless self-coupling constant t for the traceless mode. In this paper we study a model where the measure can be evaluated in the limit $t \to 0$ exactly, using the background-metric independence for the conformal mode. The t-dependence of the measure is determined perturbatively using the background-metric independence for the traceless mode. 
Ken-ji Hamada and Fumihiko Sugino