We study the recently proposed AdS$_7$/CFT$_6$ dualities for a class of 6d $\mathcal{N} = (1,0)$ theories that flow on the tensor branch to long linear quiver gauge theories. We find a precise agreement in the symmetries and in the spectrum of charged states between the 6d SCFTs and their conjectured AdS$_7$ duals. We also confirm a recent conjecture that a discrete $S_N$ symmetry relating the baryons in the quiver theories is in fact gauged.
I review recent work on the holographic relation between higher-spin theories in Anti-de Sitter spaces and conformal field theories. I present the main results of studies concerning the higher-spin holographic dual of the three-dimensional O(N) vector model. I discuss the special role played by certain double-trace deformations in Conformal Field Theories that have higher-spin holographic duals. Using the canonical formulation I show that duality transformations in a U(1) gauge theory on AdS4 induce boundary double-trace deformations. I argue that a similar effect takes place in the holography…
Recently it was proposed that asymptotically flat spacetimes have a holographic dual which is an ultra-relativistic conformal field theory. In this paper, we obtain the conformal anomaly for such a theory via the flat-space holography technique. Furthermore, using flat-space holography we obtain a C-function for this theory which is monotonically decreasing from the UV to the IR by employing the null energy condition in the bulk.
We revisit the N=6 superconformal Chern-Simons-matter theories and their supergravity duals in the context of generalized symmetries. This allows us to finally clarify how the $SU(N)\times SU(N)$ and $(SU(N)\times SU(N))/\mathbb{Z}_N$ theories, as well as other quotient theories that have recently been discussed, fit into the holographic framework. It also resolves a long standing puzzle regarding the di-baryon operator in the $U(N)\times U(N)$ theory.
We obtain the reflected entropy for bipartite states in a class of $(1+1)$-dimensional Galilean conformal field theories ($GCFT_{1+1}$) through a replica technique. Furthermore we compare our results with the entanglement wedge cross section (EWCS) obtained for the dual (2+1) dimensional asymptotically flat geometries in the context of flat holography. We find that our results are consistent with the duality between the reflected entropy and the bulk EWCS for flat holographic scenarios.
We study chaos in non-Lorentzian field theories, specifically Galilean and Carrollian conformal field theories in two dimensions. In a large central charge limit, we find that the Lyapunov exponent saturates the bound on chaos, conjectured originally for relativistic field theories. We recover the same Lyapunov exponent holographically by a shock-wave calculation in three-dimensional flat space cosmologies, providing further evidence for flat space holography.
It has been conjectured that Little String Theories in six dimensions are holographic to critical string theory in a linear dilaton background. We test this conjecture for theories arising on the worldvolume of heterotic fivebranes. We compute the spectrum of chiral primaries in these theories and compare with results following from Type I-heterotic duality and the AdS/CFT correspondence. We also construct holographic duals for heterotic fivebranes near orbifold singularities. Finally we find several new Little String Theories which have Spin(32)/Z_2 or E_8 \times E_8 global symmetry but do no…
In this thesis we investigate some aspects of quantum field theories from a holographic perspective. In the first chapters we examine in detail a one-paremeter family of three-dimensional gauge theories by means of their type IIA gravity duals. We analyse features such as their confinement nature, spectrum, entanglement properties or thermal phase transitions. This family interpolates between quasi-conformal and quasi-confining physics. In the last two chapters, we use bottom-up models to study complex conformal field theories and transport properties of dense QCD respectively.
In this paper,based on the available mathematical works on geometry and topology of hyperbolic manifolds and discrete groups, some results of Freedman et al (hep-th/9804058) are reproduced and broadly generalized. Among many new results the possibility of extension of work of Belavin, Polyakov and Zamolodchikov to higher dimensions is investigated. Known in physical literature objections against such extension are removed and the possibility of an extension is convincingly demonstrated.
The odd entanglement entropy (OEE) for bipartite states in a class of $(1+1)$-dimensional Galilean conformal field theories ($GCFT_{1+1}$) is obtained through an appropriate replica technique. In this context our results are compared with the entanglement wedge cross section (EWCS) for $(2+1)$-dimensional asymptotically flat geometries dual to the $GCFT_{1+1}$ in the framework of flat holography. We find that our results are consistent with the duality of the difference between the odd entanglement entropy and the entanglement entropy of bipartite states, with the bulk EWCS for flat holographi…
We use holography and a string probe approach to compute the drag force on a quark moving in a thermal plasma of non-commutative Yang-Mills (NCYM) theories in various dimensions. The gravity background in these cases are described by a particular decoupling limit of non-extremal (D$(p-2)$, D$p$) brane bound state system. We show how the drag force on an external quark moving in the dual NCYM theories gets corrected due to non-commutativity and as a result the effective viscosity of the plasma gets reduced. We have obtained the drag force for both small and large non-commutativity. This was kno…
We perform several tests on a recent proposal by Shifman and Stepanyantz for an exact expression for the current correlation functions in supersymmetric gauge theories. We clarify the meaning of the relation in superconformal theories. In particular we show that it automatically follows from known relations between the current correlation functions and anomalies. It therefore also automatically matches between different dual realizations of the same superconformal theory. We use holographic examples as well as calculations in free theories to show that the proposed relation fails in theories w…
We study the Schwinger pair production in confining theories. The production rate in an external electric field E is numerically evaluated by using the holographic description. There exist two kinds of critical values of the electric field, i) E=E_c, above which there is no potential barrier and particles are freely generated, ii) E=E_s, below which the confining string tension dominates the electric field and the pair production does not occur. We argue the universal exponents associated with the critical behaviors.
We investigate a class of near-extremal solutions of Einstein-Maxwell-scalar theory with electric charge and power law scaling, dual to charged IR phases of relativistic field theories at low temperature. These are exact solutions of theories with domain wall vacua; hence, we use nonconformal holography to relate the bulk and boundary theories. We numerically construct a global interpolating solution between the IR charged solutions and the UV domain wall vacua for arbitrary physical choices of Lagrangian parameters. By passing to a conformal frame in which the domain wall metric becomes that …
This dissertation consists of three parts. The first part of the thesis is devoted to the study of gravity and higher spin gauge theories in 2+1 dimensions. The first part deals with cosmological solutions of spin-3 gravity and their thermodynamics, flat space limit of AdS$_3$ gravity and higher spins using Grassmann approach and chiral higher spin solutions with the most general AdS$_3$ boundary condition. The second part is devoted to the problem of Neumann boundary condition in Einstein's gravity. We present an explicit boundary term that makes the Neumann variational problem well posed and…
Recent progress in holographic correspondence uncovered remarkable relations between key characteristics of the theories on both sides of duality and certain integrable models. In this note we revisit the problem of the role of certain invariants in low-dimensional holography. As motivating example we consider first the entanglement entropy in 2d CFT and projective invariants. Next we consider higher projective invariants and suggest generalization to higher spin theories. Quadratic in invariants deformations is considered and conjectured to play role in low-dimensional higher spin holography.
We compare exact results from Pestun's localization of SU(N) N=2^* gauge theory on S^4 with available holographic models. While localization can explain the Coulomb branch vacuum of the holographic Pilch-Warner flow, it disagrees with the holographic Gauntlett et.al vacuum of N=2 super Yang-Mills theory. We further compute the free energy of the Pilch-Warner flow on S^4 and show that it disagrees with the localization result both for a finite S^4 radius, and in the S^4 decompactification limit. Thus, neither model represents holographic dual of supersymmetric S^4 localization of Pestun.
Massive QCD at $θ=π$ breaks CP spontaneously and admits domain walls whose dynamics and phases depend on the number of flavors and their masses. We discuss these issues within the Witten-Sakai-Sugimoto model of holographic QCD. Besides showing that this model reproduces all QCD expectations, we address two interesting claims in the literature. The first is about the possibility that the QCD domain-wall theory is fully captured by three-dimensional physics, only. The second regards the existence of quantum phases in certain Chern-Simons theories coupled to fundamental matter. Both claims are su…
We consider holography for d-dimensional scale invariant but non-Lorentz invariant field theories, which do not admit the full Schrodinger symmetry group. We find new realizations of the corresponding (d+1)-dimensional gravity duals, engineered with a variety of matter Lagrangians, and their finite temperature generalizations. The thermodynamic properties of the finite temperature backgrounds are precisely those expected for anisotropic, scale invariant field theories. The brane and string theory realizations of such backgrounds are briefly discussed, along with their holographic interpretatio…
We study the functional class and locality problems in the context of higher-spin theories and Vasiliev's equations. A locality criterion that is sufficient to make higher-spin theories well-defined as field theories on Anti-de-Sitter space is proposed. This criterion identifies admissible pseudo-local field redefinitions which preserve AdS/CFT correlation functions as we check in the 3d example. Implications of this analysis for known higher-spin theories are discussed. We also check that the cubic coupling coefficients previously fixed in 3d at the action level give the correct CFT correlati…
We show that the squared speed of sound v_{s}^{2} is bounded from above at high temperatures by the conformal value of 1/3 in a class of strongly coupled four-dimensional field theories, given some mild technical assumptions. This class consists of field theories that have gravity duals sourced by a single scalar field. There are no known examples to date of field theories with gravity duals for which v_{s}^{2} exceeds 1/3 in energetically favored configurations. We conjecture that v_{s}^{2}=1/3 represents an upper bound for a broad class of four-dimensional theories.
Duality transformations involving compactifications on timelike as well as spacelike circles link M-theory, the 10+1-dimensional strong coupling limit of IIA string theory, to other 11-dimensional theories in signatures 9+2 and 6+5 and to type II string theories in all 10-dimensional signatures. These theories have BPS branes of various world-volume signatures, and here we construct the world-volume theories for these branes, which in each case have 16 supersymmetries. For the generalised D-branes of the various type II string theories, these are always supersymmetric Yang-Mills theories with …
We study a three-dimensional N=3 U(N)_k x U(N)_{-k} Chern-Simons matter theory with flavour, corresponding to the N=6 Aharony-Bergman-Jafferis-Maldacena CSM theory coupled to 2N_f fundamental fields. The dual holographic description is given by the near-horizon geometry of N M2-branes at a particular hypertoric geometry M_8. We explicitly construct the space M_8 and match its isometries to the global symmetries of the field theory. We also discuss the model in the quenched approximation by embedding probe D6-branes in AdS_4 x CP^3.
In a four-dimensional $\mathcal{N}=2$ superconformal quiver theory with gauge group $\mathrm{SU}(N)\times\mathrm{SU}(N)$ and bi-fundamental matter, we analytically obtain the exact strong-coupling behavior of the normalized 3-point correlators of single-trace scalar operators in the large-$N$ limit using localization techniques. We then obtain the same strong-coupling behavior from the holographic dual using the AdS/CFT correspondence at the supergravity level. This agreement confirms the validity of the analytic strong-coupling results and of the holographic correspondence in a non-maximally …
In this article we review recent progress on the holographic modelling of field theories with Lifshitz symmetry. We focus in particular on the holographic dictionary for Lifshitz backgrounds - the relationship between bulk fields and boundary operators, operator correlation functions and underlying geometrical structure. The holographic dictionary is essential in identifying the universality class of strongly coupled Lifshitz theories described by gravitational models.
We study 4-dimensional $\mathcal{N}=2$ superconformal quiver gauge theories obtained with an orbifold projection from $\mathcal{N}=4$ SYM, and compute the 2- and 3-point correlation functions among chiral/anti-chiral single-trace scalar operators and the corresponding structure constants. Exploiting localization, we map the computation to an interacting matrix model and obtain expressions for the correlators and the structure constants that are valid for any value of the 't Hooft coupling in the planar limit of the theory. At strong coupling, these expressions simplify and allow us to extract …
M-theory on $AdS_7 \times S^4$ admits a description where the $AdS_7$ factor is constructed as a timelike Hopf fibration over a non-compact three dimensional complex projective space $\tilde{\mathbb{CP}}^3$. We consider the worldvolume theory for M5-branes at a fixed $\tilde{\mathbb{CP}}^3$ radius which, after reduction along the timelike fibre, is given by an $Ω$-deformed Yang-Mills theory with eight supercharges. Taking the radius to infinity then induces a classical RG flow. We construct the fixed point action which has an enhanced 24 supercharges and which can be understood as the $(2,0)$ …
Entanglement entropy plays a variety of roles in quantum field theory, including the connections between quantum states and gravitation through the holographic principle. This article provides a review of entanglement entropy from a mixed viewpoint of field theory and holography. A set of basic methods for the computation is developed and illustrated with simple examples such as free theories and conformal field theories. The structures of the ultraviolet divergences and the universal parts are determined and compared with the holographic descriptions of entanglement entropy. The utility of qu…
For a closed system to equilibrate from a given initial condition there must exist an equilibrium state with the energy equal to the initial one. Equilibrium states of a strongly coupled gauge theory with a gravitational holographic dual are represented by black holes. We study the spectrum of black holes in Pilch-Warner geometry. These black holes are holographically dual to equilibrium states of strongly coupled $SU(N)$ ${\cal N}=2^*$ gauge theory plasma on $S^3$ in the planar limit. We find that there is no energy gap in the black hole spectrum. Thus, there is a priory no obstruction for eq…
We discuss aspects of generic 2-dimensional dilaton gravity theories. The 2-dim geometry is in general conformal to $AdS_2$ and has IR curvature singularities at zero temperature: this can be regulated by a black hole. The on-shell action is divergent: we discuss the holographic energy-momentum tensor by adding appropriate counterterms. For theories obtained by dimensional reduction of the gravitational sector of higher dimensional theories, for instance higher dimensional $AdS$ gravity as a concrete example, the 2-dimensional description dovetails with the higher dimensional one. We also disc…
An entanglement Renyi entropy for a spatial partition of a system is studied in conformal theories which admit a dual description in terms of an anti-de Sitter gravity. The divergent part of the Renyi entropy is computed in 4D conformal N=4 super Yang-Mills theory at a weak coupling. This result is used to suggest a holographic formula which reproduces the Renyi entropy at least in the leading approximation. The holographic Renyi entropy is an invariant functional set on a codimension 2 minimal hypersurface in the bulk geometry. The bulk space does not depend on order $n$ of the Renyi entropy.…
Holographic theories representing black holes are expected to exhibit quantum chaos. We argue if the laws of quantum mechanics are expected to hold for observers inside such black holes, then such holographic theories must have a mean field approximation valid for typical black hole states, and for timescales approaching the scrambling time. Using simple spin models as examples, we examine the predictions of such an approach for observers inside black holes, and more speculatively inside cosmological horizons.
We construct Schroedinger-like solutions of the Vasiliev higher spin theory in D>3 dimension. Symmetries of such solutions and the linearised equation of motion for the scalar on such backgrounds are analysed. We further propose Galilean invariant bosonic and fermionic field theories that could be dual to the two parity invariant higher spin theories on the Schroedinger-like background respectively. The discussion is phrased mainly in D=4 dimension, while similar constructions follow straightforwardly in higher dimensions.
We study RG flows between superconformal field theories living in different spacetime dimensions which exhibit universal properties, independent of the details of the UV and IR theories. In particular, when the UV and IR theories are both even-dimensional we establish exact universal relations between their conformal anomaly coefficients. We also provide strong evidence for similar relations between appropriately defined free energies for RG flows between odd-dimensional theories in the large $N$ limit. Holographically, these RG flows across dimensions are described by asymptotically AdS black…
We study the Kaluza-Klein reduction of various $6d$ holomorphic theories. The KK reduction is analyzed in the BV formalism, resulting in theories that come from the holomorphic topological twist of $3d$ $\mathcal{N} = 2$ supersymmetric field theories. Effective interactions of the KK theories at the classical level can be obtained at all orders using homotopy transfer theorem. We also analyze a deformation of the theories that comes from deforming the spacetime geometry to $SL_2(\mathbb{C})$ due to the brane back-reaction. We study the boundary chiral algebras for the various KK theories. Usin…
We consider a free topological model in 5D euclidean flat spacetime, built from two rank-2 tensor fields. Despite the fact that the bulk of the model does not have any particular physical interpretation, on its 4D planar edge nontrivial gauge field theories are recovered, whose features are entirely determined by the gauge and discrete symmetries of the bulk. In particular no 4D dynamics can be obtained without imposing a Time Reversal invariance in the bulk. Remarkably, one of the two possible edge models selected by the Time Reversal symmetries displays a true electromagnetic duality, which …
The "periodic table" of strongly coupled gauge theories remains only sketchily understood. Holography has developed to the point where bottom up constructions can describe the spectrum of individual gauge theories (based on assumptions of their running) including quarks in different representations and higher dimension operators. I highlight the method with a "perfected" version of an AdS dual of QCD and results for composite higgs models with two representations of quarks. The method raises questions about the degree to which energy scales can be split in generic gauge theories including whet…
School of Science, Huzhou Normal University（湖州师范学院理学院）；Mandelstam Institute for Theoretical Physics, School of Physics, University of the Witwatersrand（维特沃特斯兰德大学物理学院曼德尔斯坦理论物理研究所）；Department of Physics and Astronomy & Center for Theoretical Physics, Seoul National University（首尔大学物理天文学系及理论物理中心）
The space of ${\cal N}=4$ supersymmetric Yang-Mills theories exhibits an intricate structure of global one-form symmetries and $SL(2,\mathbb{Z})$ duality orbits. In this paper we study this structure from the point of view of the holographic dual Type IIB string theory. Generalizing work by Witten, we map the different theories based on the gauge algebras $su(N)$, $so(N)$, and $sp(N)$ to a choice of boundary conditions on bulk gauge fields. We show how the one-form symmetries and their anomalies, as well as the duality properties of the gauge theories, arise in the holographic picture. Along t…
We present the analytical calculation of entanglement entropy for a class of two dimensional field theories governed by the symmetries of the Galilean conformal algebra, thus providing a rare example of such an exact computation. These field theories are the putative holographic duals to theories of gravity in three-dimensional asymptotically flat spacetimes. We provide a check of our field theory answers by an analysis of geodesics. We also exploit the Chern-Simons formulation of three-dimensional gravity and adapt recent proposals of calculating entanglement entropy by Wilson lines in this c…
We initiate a study of the holographic duals of a class of four-dimensional $\mathcal{N}=2$ superconformal field theories that are engineered by wrapping M5-branes on a sphere with an irregular puncture. These notably include the strongly-coupled field theories of Argyres-Douglas type. Our solutions are obtained in 7d gauged supergravity, where they take the form of a warped product of $AdS_5$ and a "half-spindle." The irregular puncture is modeled by a localized M5-brane source in the internal space of the gravity duals. Our solutions feature a realization of supersymmetry that is distinct fr…
Mani L. Bhaumik Institute for Theoretical Physics, Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of California, Los Angeles（加州大学洛杉矶分校曼尼·L·巴乌米克理论物理研究所物理学与天文学系）
In this short review we compare the rigid Noether charges to topological gauge charges. One important extension is that one should consider each boundary component of spacetime independently. The argument that relates bulk charges to surface terms can be adapted to the perfect fluid situation where one can recognise the helicity and enstrophies as Noether charges. More generally a forcing procedure that increases for instance any Noether charge is demonstrated. In the gauge theory situation, the key idea can be summarized by one sentence: ``go to infinity and stay there''. A new variational fo…
We investigate the application of our recent holographic entanglement negativity conjecture for higher dimensional conformal field theories to specific examples which serve as crucial consistency checks. In this context we compute the holographic entanglement negativity for bipartite pure and finite temperature mixed state configurations in $d$-dimensional conformal field theories dual to bulk pure $AdS_{d+1}$ geometry and $AdS_{d+1}$-Schwarzschild black holes respectively. It is observed that the holographic entanglement negativity characterizes the distillable entanglement for the finite tem…
The correspondences proposed previously between higher spin gauge theories and free singleton field theories were recently extended into a more complete picture by Klebanov and Polyakov in the case of the minimal bosonic theory in D=4 to include the strongly coupled fixed point of the 3d O(N) vector model. Here we propose an N=1 supersymmetric version of this picture. We also elaborate on the role of parity in constraining the bulk interactions, and in distinguishing two minimal bosonic models obtained as two different consistent truncations of the minimal N=1 model that retain the scalar or t…
We study several aspects of holographic entanglement in two models known as flat$_3$/BMSFT and (W)AdS$_3$/WCFT. These are two examples of holography beyond AdS/CFT where the the boundary field theories are not Lorentz invariant but still feature an infinite set of local symmetries. In the first example, BMS-invariant field theories (BMSFTs) are conjectured to provide a holographic description of quantum gravity in asymptotically flat three-dimensional spacetimes; while in the second example, warped conformal field theories (WCFTs) are proposed to describe quantum gravity in warped AdS$_3$ or A…
It is known that the chiral part of any 2d conformal field theory defines a 3d topological quantum field theory: quantum states of this TQFT are the CFT conformal blocks. The main aim of this paper is to show that a similar CFT/TQFT relation exists also for the full CFT. The 3d topological theory that arises is a certain ``square'' of the chiral TQFT. Such topological theories were studied by Turaev and Viro; they are related to 3d gravity. We establish an operator/state correspondence in which operators in the chiral TQFT correspond to states in the Turaev-Viro theory. We use this corresponde…
We generalize the $T\overline{T}$ deformation of CFT$_2$ to higher-dimensional large-$N$ CFTs, and show that in holographic theories, the resulting effective field theory matches semiclassical gravity in AdS with a finite radial cutoff. We also derive the deformation dual to arbitrary bulk matter theories. Generally, the deformations involve background fields as well as CFT operators. By keeping track of these background fields along the flow, we demonstrate how to match correlation functions on the two sides in some simple examples, as well as other observables.
Gauge theories living on stacks of D7-branes are holographically related to IIB gravitational backgrounds with a varying axion-dilaton field (F-theory). The axion-dilaton field is generated by D7, O7 and D-instanton sources and can be written in terms of the chiral correlators of the eight dimensional gauge theory living on the D7-branes. Using localization techniques, we prove that the same correlators determine the gauge coupling of the four-dimensional N=2 supersymmetric SU(2) gauge theories living on the elementary D3-brane which probes the F-theory geometries.
As an extension of the so-called BMN conjecture, we investigate the plane-wave limit for possible holographic connection between bulk string theories in non-conformal backgrounds of D$p$-branes and the corresponding supersymmetric gauge theories for $p<5$. Our work is based on the tunneling picture for dominant null trajectories of strings in the limit of large angular momentum. The tunneling null trajectories start from the near-horizon boundary and return to the boundary, and the resulting backgrounds are time-dependent for general D$p$-branes except for $p=3$. We develop a general method fo…
We embed a holographic description of a quantum field theory with Galilean conformal invariance in string theory. The key observation is that such field theories may be realized as conventional superconformal field theories with a known string theory embedding, twisted by the R-symmetry in a light-like direction. Using the Null Melvin Twist, we construct the appropriate dual geometry and its non-extremal generalization. From the nonzero temperature solution we determine the equation of state. We also discuss the hydrodynamic regime of these non-relativistic plasmas and show that the shear visc…
We show that a class of Einstein-Maxwell-Dilaton (EMD) theories are related to higher dimensional AdS-Maxwell gravity via a dimensional reduction over compact Einstein spaces combined with continuation in the dimension of the compact space to non-integral values (`generalized dimensional reduction'). This relates (fairly complicated) black hole solutions of EMD theories to simple black hole/brane solutions of AdS-Maxwell gravity and explains their properties. The generalized dimensional reduction is used to infer the holographic dictionary and the hydrodynamic behavior for this class of theori…
