Dimensional CFT Research Articles

Example of the convergence of hydrodynamics in strong external fields

The anti-de-Sitter/conformal field theory (AdS/CFT) correspondence is used to provide an estimate of the radius of convergence of the linearized gradient expansion of the hydrodynamic description of N=4 supersymmetric Yang-Mills (SYM) theory minimally coupled to U(1) gauge theory subjected to strong magnetic fields. The results of this work demonstrate that the dispersion relations of hydrodynamic modes continue to converge for magnetic field strengths far beyond those values for which a hydrodynamic description is expected. For magnetic field strengths much larger then the temperature scale the bulk dual interpolates between AdS4+1 and the product of a Bañados-Teitelboim-Zanelli (BTZ) black hole and a two dimensional manifold (BTZ2+1×R2) and may be regarded as a renormalization group flow of the 3+1 dimensional CFT to a 1+1 dimensional CFT. In this regime, we clarify past literature on the quasi-normal mode (QNM) spectrum of bulk scalar fields by introducing a new way to classify the behavior of QNM collisions in the complex frequency and momentum plane. Published by the American Physical Society 2024

Celestial sector in CFT: Conformally soft symmetries

We show that time intervals of width \Delta \tauΔτ in 3-dimensional conformal field theories (CFT_33) on the Lorentzian cylinder admit an infinite dimensional symmetry enhancement in the limit \Delta \tau → 0Δτ→0. The associated vector fields are approximate solutions to the conformal Killing equations in the strip labelled by a function and a conformal Killing vector on the sphere. An Inonu-Wigner contraction yields a set of symmetry generators obeying the extended BMS_44 algebra. We analyze the shadow stress tensor Ward identities in CFT_dd on the Lorentzian cylinder with all operator insertions in infinitesimal time intervals separated by \piπ. We demonstrate that both the leading and subleading conformally soft graviton theorems in (d-1)(d−1)-dimensional celestial CFT (CCFT_{d-1}d−1) can be recovered from the transverse traceless components of these Ward identities in the limit \Delta \tau → 0Δτ→0. A similar construction allows for the leading conformally soft gluon theorem in CCFT_{d-1}d−1 to be recovered from shadow current Ward identities in CFT_dd.

Dynamics of charge imbalance resolved negativity after a local joining quench

In this paper, we consider the dynamics of charge imbalance resolved negativity after a local joining quench in the 1 + 1 dimensional free complex boson CFT. In the first part, we study the local joining quench by applying conformal maps, obtaining analytical universal results. We first calculate the quench dynamics of charged logarithmic negativity. Then using the Fourier transformation, we obtain the charge imbalance resolved negativity. The total negativity can be recovered from the charge-resolved ones. In the second part, we test our CFT predictions against the underlying lattice model numerically. Finally, we explain our results based on the quasi-particle picture.

Chaos and operator growth in 2d CFT

We study the out-of-time-ordered correlator (OTOC) in a zero temperature 2d large-c CFT under evolution by a Liouvillian composed of the Virasoro generators. A bound was conjectured in [1] on the growth of the OTOC set by the Krylov complexity which is a measure of operator growth. The latter grows as an exponential of time with exponent 2α, which sets an upper bound on the Lyapunov exponent, ΛL≤ 2α. We find that for a two dimensional zero temperature CFT, the OTOC decays exponentially with a Lyapunov exponent which saturates this bound. We show that these Virasoro generators form the modular Hamiltonian of the CFT with half space traced out. Therefore, evolution by this modular Hamiltonian gives rise to thermal dynamics in a zero temperature CFT. Leveraging the thermal dynamics of the system, we derive this bound in a zero temperature CFT using the analyticity and boundedness properties of the OTOC.

Energy-twisted boundary condition and response in one-dimensional quantum many-body systems

Thermal transport in condensed matter systems is traditionally formulated as a response to a background gravitational field. In this work, we seek a twisted-boundary-condition formalism for thermal transport in analogy to the U(1) twisted boundary condition for electrical transport. Specifically, using the transfer matrix formalism, we introduce what we call the energy-twisted boundary condition, and study the response of the system to the boundary condition. As specific examples, we obtain the thermal Meissner stiffness of (1+1)-dimensional CFT, the Ising model, and disordered fermion models. We also identify the boost deformation of integrable systems as a bulk counterpart of the energy-twisted boundary condition. We show that the boost deformation of the free fermion chain can be solved explicitly by solving the inviscid Burgers equation. We also discuss the boost deformation of the XXZ model, and its nonlinear thermal Drude weights, by studying the boost-deformed Bethe ansatz equations.

Scattering strings off quantum extremal surfaces

We consider a Hayden & Preskill like setup for both maximally chaotic and sub-maximally chaotic quantum field theories. We act on the vacuum with an operator in a Rindler like wedge R and transfer a small subregion I of R to the other wedge. The chaotic scrambling dynamics of the QFT Rindler time evolution reveals the information in the other wedge. The holographic dual of this process involves a particle excitation falling into the bulk and crossing into the entanglement wedge of the complement to r = R\\I. With the goal of studying the locality of the emergent holographic theory we compute various quantum information measures on the boundary that tell us when the particle has entered this entanglement wedge. In a maximally chaotic theory, these measures indicate a sharp transition where the particle enters the wedge exactly when the insertion is null separated from the quantum extremal surface for r. For sub-maximally chaotic theories, we find a smoothed crossover at a delayed time given in terms of the smaller Lyapunov exponent and dependent on the time-smearing scale of the probe excitation. The information quantities that we consider include the full vacuum modular energy R\\I as well as the fidelity between the state with the particle and the state without. Along the way, we find a new explicit formula for the modular Hamiltonian of two intervals in an arbitrary 1+1 dimensional CFT to leading order in the small cross ratio limit. We also give an explicit calculation of the Regge limit of the modular flowed chaos correlator and find examples which do not saturate the modular chaos bound. Finally, we discuss the extent to which our results reveal properties of the target of the probe excitation as a “stringy quantum extremal surface” or simply quantify the probe itself thus giving a new approach to studying the notion of longitudinal string spreading.

Higher-curvature gravities from braneworlds and the holographic c -theorem

We study the structure of the higher-curvature gravitational densities that are induced from holographic renormalization in AdS$_{d+1}$. In a braneworld construction, such densities define a d-dimensional higher-curvature gravitational theory on the brane, which in turn is dual to a (d-1)-dimensional CFT living at its boundary. We show that this CFT$_{d-1}$ satisfies a holographic c-theorem in general dimensions (different than the g-theorem of holographic boundary CFTs), since at each and every order the higher-curvature densities satisfy c-theorems on their own. We find that, in these densities, the terms that affect the monotonicity of the holographic c-function are algebraic in the curvature, and do not involve covariant derivatives of the Riemann tensor. We examine various other features of the holographically induced higher-curvature densities, such as the presence of reduced-order traced equations, and their connection to Born-Infeld-type gravitational Lagrangians.

Transverse spin in the light-ray OPE

We study a product of null-integrated local operators {mathcal{O}}_1 and {mathcal{O}}_2 on the same null plane in a CFT. Such null-integrated operators transform like primaries in a fictitious d − 2 dimensional CFT in the directions transverse to the null integrals. We give a complete description of the OPE in these transverse directions. The terms with low transverse spin are light-ray operators with spin J1 + J2− 1. The terms with higher transverse spin are primary descendants of light-ray operators with higher spins J1 + J2− 1 + n, constructed using special conformally-invariant differential operators that appear precisely in the kinematics of the light-ray OPE. As an example, the OPE between average null energy operators contains light-ray operators with spin 3 (as described by Hofman and Maldacena), but also novel terms with spin 5, 7, 9, etc. These new terms are important for describing energy two-point correlators in non-rotationally-symmetric states, and for computing multi-point energy correlators. We check our formulas in a non-rotationally-symmetric energy correlator in mathcal{N} = 4 SYM, finding perfect agreement.

Boundary conformal field theory at large charge

We study operators with large internal charge in boundary conformal field theories (BCFTs) with internal symmetries. Using the state-operator correspondence and the existence of a macroscopic limit, we find a non-trivial relation between the scaling dimension of the lowest dimensional CFT and BCFT charged operators to leading order in the charge. We also construct the superfluid effective field theory for theories with boundaries and use it to systematically calculate the BCFT spectrum in a systematic expansion. We verify explicitly many of the predictions from the EFT analysis in concrete examples including the classical conformal scalar field with a |ϕ|6 interaction in three dimensions and the O(2) Wilson-Fisher model near four dimensions in the presence of boundaries. In the appendices we additionally discuss a systematic background field approach towards Ward identities in general boundary and defect conformal field theories, and clarify its relation with Noether’s theorem in perturbative theories.

First law of entanglement entropy in AdS black hole backgrounds

The first law for entanglement entropy in CFT in an odd-dimensional asymptotically AdS black hole is studied by using the AdS/CFT duality. The entropy of CFT considered here is due to the entanglement between two subsystems separated by the horizon of the AdS black hole, which itself is realized as the conformal boundary of a black droplet in even-dimensional global AdS bulk spacetime. In $(2+1)$-dimensional CFT, the first law is shown to be always satisfied by analyzing a class of metric perturbations of the exact solution of a $4$-dimensional black droplet. In $(4+1)$-dimensions, the first law for CFT is shown to hold under the Neumann boundary condition at a certain bulk hypersurface anchored to the conformal boundary of the boundary AdS black hole. From the boundary view point, this Neumann condition yields there being no energy flux across the boundary of the boundary AdS black hole. Furthermore, the asymptotic geometry of a $6$-dimensional small AdS black droplet is constructed as the gravity dual of our $(4+1)$-dimensional CFT, which exhibits a negative energy near the spatial infinity, as expected from vacuum polarization.

Pole skipping and zero temperature

We study the pole-skipping phenomenon of the scalar retarded Green's function in the rotating BTZ black hole background. In the static case, the pole-skipping points are typically located at negative imaginary Matsubara frequencies $\omega=-(2\pi T)ni$ with appropriate values of complex wave number $q$. But, in a $(1+1)$-dimensional CFT, one can introduce temperatures for left-moving and right-moving sectors independently. As a result, the pole-skipping points $\omega$ depend both on left and right temperatures in the rotating background. In the extreme limit, the pole-skipping does not occur in general. But in a special case, the pole-skipping does occur even in the extreme limit, and the pole-skipping points are given by right Matsubara frequencies.

Dimensional reduction of higher-point conformal blocks

Recently, with the help of Parisi-Sourlas supersymmetry an intriguing relation was found expressing the four-point scalar conformal block of a (d − 2)-dimensional CFT in terms of a five-term linear combination of blocks of a d-dimensional CFT, with constant coefficients. We extend this dimensional reduction relation to all higher-point scalar conformal blocks of arbitrary topology restricted to scalar exchanges. We show that the constant coefficients appearing in the finite term higher-point dimensional reduction obey an interesting factorization property allowing them to be determined in terms of certain graphical Feynman-like rules and the associated finite set of vertex and edge factors. Notably, these rules can be fully determined by considering the explicit power-series representation of just three particular conformal blocks: the four-point block, the five-point block and the six-point block of the so-called OPE/snowflake topology. In principle, this method can be applied to obtain the arbitrary-point dimensional reduction of conformal blocks with spinning exchanges as well. We also show how to systematically extend the dimensional reduction relation of conformal partial waves to higher-points.

Bra-ket wormholes in gravitationally prepared states

We consider two dimensional CFT states that are produced by a gravitational path integral.As a first case, we consider a state produced by Euclidean AdS2 evolution followed by flat space evolution. We use the fine grained entropy formula to explore the nature of the state. We find that the naive hyperbolic space geometry leads to a paradox. This is solved if we include a geometry that connects the bra with the ket, a bra-ket wormhole. The semiclassical Lorentzian interpretation leads to CFT state entangled with an expanding and collapsing Friedmann cosmology.As a second case, we consider a state produced by Lorentzian dS2 evolution, again followed by flat space evolution. The most naive geometry also leads to a similar paradox. We explore several possible bra-ket wormholes. The most obvious one leads to a badly divergent temperature. The most promising one also leads to a divergent temperature but by making a projection onto low energy states we find that it has features that look similar to the previous Euclidean case. In particular, the maximum entropy of an interval in the future is set by the de Sitter entropy.

New holographic generalization of entanglement entropy

We introduce a quantity, called pseudo entropy, as a generalization of entanglement entropy via post-selection. In the AdS/CFT correspondence, this quantity is dual to areas of minimal area surfaces in time-dependent Euclidean spaces which are asymptotically AdS. We study its basic properties and classifications in qubit systems. In specific examples, we provide a quantum information theoretic meaning of this new quantity as an averaged number of Bell pairs when the post-selection is performed. We also present properties of the pseudo entropy for random states. We then calculate the pseudo entropy in the presence of local operator excitations for both the two dimensional free massless scalar CFT and two dimensional holographic CFTs. We find a general property in CFTs that the pseudo entropy is highly reduced when the local operators get closer to the boundary of the subsystem. We also compute the holographic pseudo entropy for a Janus solution, dual to an exactly marginal perturbation of a two dimensional CFT and find its agreement with a perturbative calculation in the dual CFT. We show the linearity property holds for holographic states, where the holographic pseudo entropy coincides with a weak value of the area operator. Finally, we propose a mixed state generalization of pseudo entropy and give its gravity dual.

An exact construction of codimension two holography

Recently, a codimension two holography called wedge holography is proposed as a generalization of AdS/CFT. It is conjectured that a gravitational theory in d + 1 dimensional wedge spacetime is dual to a d − 1 dimensional CFT on the corner of the wedge. In this paper, we give an exact construction of the gravitational solutions for wedge holography from the ones in AdS/CFT. By applying this construction, we prove the equivalence between wedge holography and AdS/CFT for vacuum Einstein gravity, by showing that the classical gravitational action and thus the CFT partition function in large N limit are the same for the two theories. The equivalence to AdS/CFT can be regarded as a “proof” of wedge holography in a certain sense. As an application of this powerful equivalence, we derive easily the holographic Weyl anomaly, holographic Entanglement/Rényi entropy and correlation functions for wedge holography. Besides, we discuss the general solutions of wedge holography and argue that they correspond to the AdS/CFT with suitable matter fields. Interestingly, we notice that the intrinsic Ricci scalar on the brane is always a constant, which depends on the tension. Finally, we generalize the discussions to dS/CFT and flat space holography. Remarkably, we find that AdS/CFT, dS/CFT and flat space holography can be unified in the framework of codimension two holography in asymptotically AdS. Different dualities are distinguished by different types of spacetimes on the brane.

Codimension-two holography for wedges

We propose a codimension two holography between a gravitational theory on a $d+1$ dimensional wedge spacetime and a $d-1$ dimensional CFT which lives on the corner of the wedge. Formulating this as a generalization of AdS/CFT, we explain how to compute the free energy, entanglement entropy and correlation functions of the dual CFTs from gravity. In this wedge holography, the holographic entanglement entropy is computed by a double minimization procedure. Especially, for a four dimensional gravity ($d=3$), we obtain a two dimensional CFT and the holographic entanglement entropy perfectly reproduces the known result expected from the holographic conformal anomaly. We also discuss a lower dimensional example ($d=2$) and find that a universal quantity naturally arises from gravity, which is analogous to the boundary entropy. Moreover, we consider a gravity on a wedge region in Lorentzian AdS, which is expected to be dual to a CFT with a space-like boundary. We formulate this new holography and compute the holographic entanglement entropy via a Wick rotation of the AdS/BCFT construction. Via a conformal map, this wedge spacetime is mapped into a geometry where a bubble-of-nothing expands under time evolution. We reproduce the holographic entanglement entropy for this gravity dual via CFT calculations.

High energy modular bootstrap, global symmetries and defects

We derive Cardy-like formulas for the growth of operators in different sectors of unitary 2 dimensional CFT in the presence of topological defect lines by putting an upper and lower bound on the number of states with scaling dimension in the interval [∆ − δ, ∆ + δ] for large ∆ at fixed δ. Consequently we prove that given any unitary modular invariant 2D CFT symmetric under finite global symmetry G (acting faithfully), all the irreducible representations of G appear in the spectra of the untwisted sector; the growth of states is Cardy like and proportional to the “square” of the dimension of the irrep. In the Schwarzian limit, the result matches onto that of JT gravity with a bulk gauge theory. If the symmetry is non-anomalous, the result applies to any sector twisted by a group element. For c > 1, the statements are true for Virasoro primaries. Furthermore, the results are applicable to large c CFTs. We also extend our results for the continuous U(1) group.

Universal dynamics of heavy operators in CFT2

We obtain an asymptotic formula for the average value of the operator product expansion coefficients of any unitary, compact two dimensional CFT with c > 1. This formula is valid when one or more of the operators has large dimension or — in the presence of a twist gap — has large spin. Our formula is universal in the sense that it depends only on the central charge and not on any other details of the theory. This result unifies all previous asymptotic formulas for CFT2 structure constants, including those derived from crossing symmetry of four point functions, modular covariance of torus correlation functions, and higher genus modular invariance. We determine this formula at finite central charge by deriving crossing kernels for higher genus crossing equations, which give analytic control over the structure constants even in the absence of exact knowledge of the conformal blocks. The higher genus modular kernels are obtained by sewing together the elementary kernels for four-point crossing and modular transforms of torus one-point functions. Our asymptotic formula is related to the DOZZ formula for the structure constants of Liouville theory, and makes precise the sense in which Liouville theory governs the universal dynamics of heavy operators in any CFT. The large central charge limit provides a link with 3D gravity, where the averaging over heavy states corresponds to a coarse-graining over black hole microstates in holographic theories. Our formula also provides an improved understanding of the Eigenstate Thermalization Hypothesis (ETH) in CFT2, and suggests that ETH can be generalized to other kinematic regimes in two dimensional CFTs.

Open quantum systems and Schwinger-Keldysh holograms

We initiate the study of open quantum field theories using holographic methods. Specifically, we consider a quantum field theory (the system) coupled to a holographic field theory at finite temperature (the environment). We investigate the effects of integrating out the holographic environment with an aim of obtaining an effective dynamics for the resulting open quantum field theory. The influence functionals which enter this open effective action are determined by the real-time (Schwinger-Keldysh) correlation functions of the holographic thermal environment. To evaluate the latter, we exploit recent developments, wherein the semiclassical gravitational Schwinger-Keldysh saddle geometries were identified as complexified black hole spacetimes. We compute real-time correlation functions using holographic methods in these geometries, and argue that they lead to a sensible open effective quantum dynamics for the system in question, a question that hitherto had been left unanswered. In addition to shedding light on open quantum systems coupled to strongly correlated thermal environments, our results also provide a principled computation of Schwinger-Keldysh observables in gravity and holography. In particular, these influence functionals we compute capture both the dissipative physics of black hole quasi- normal modes, as well as that of the fluctuations encoded in outgoing Hawking quanta, and interactions between them. We obtain results for these observables at leading order in a low frequency and momentum expansion in general dimensions, in addition to determining explicit results for two dimensional holographic CFT environments.

The large charge expansion and AdS/CFT

The scaling dimensions of charged operators in conformal field theory were recently computed in a large charge expansion. We verify this expansion in a dual AdS model. Specifically, we numerically construct solitonic boson star solutions of Einstein-Maxwell-Scalar theory in AdS4 and find that its mass at large charge reproduces the universal form of the lowest operator dimension in the large U(1) charge sector of the dual 2+1 dimensional CFT.