arXiv subjects
Publications and source records attributed to Kristan Jensen.
We conjecture a new sequence of dualities between Chern-Simons gauge theories simultaneously coupled to fundamental bosons and fermions. These dualities reduce to those proposed by Aharony when the number of bosons or fermions is zero. Our conjecture passes a number of consistency checks. These include the matching of global symmetries and consistency with level/rank duality in massive phases.
We study various aspects of warped conformal field theories (WCFTs) in two dimensions. We find new Lagrangian WCFTs, and show that all known Lagrangian WCFTs are local only after an infinite tuning. We deduce the anomalies of WCFTs and relate them to central charges, as well as analyze WCFT hydrostatics, thereby re-deriving the warped analogue of the Cardy formula. Finally, we point out that holographic WCFTs are semi-local, that matter fields in spacelike WAdS$_3$ black hole geometries exhibit a Gregory-Laflamme-like instability, and that WAdS$_3$ throats do not admit a decoupling limit.
We argue that there is an obstruction to placing theories with 't Hooft anomalies on manifolds with a boundary, unless the symmetry associated with the anomaly can be represented as a non-invariance under an Abelian transformation. For a two dimensional conformal field theory we further demonstrate that all anomalies except the usual trace anomaly are incompatible on a manifold with a boundary. Our findings extend a known result whereby, under mild assumptions, Lagrangian theories with chiral matter cannot be canonically quantized.
We give simple string theory embeddings of several recently introduced dualities between 2+1-dimensional Chern-Simons matter theories using probe brane holography. Our construction is reliable in the limit of a large number of colors $N$ with fixed Chern-Simons level $k$.
Boundary conformal field theories have several additional terms in the trace anomaly of the stress tensor associated purely with the boundary. We constrain the corresponding boundary central charges in three- and four-dimensional conformal field theories in terms of two- and three-point correlation functions of the displacement operator. We provide a general derivation by comparing the trace anomaly with scale dependent contact terms in the correlation functions. We conjecture a relation between the a-type boundary charge in three dimensions and the stress tensor two-point function near the boundary. We check our results for several free theories.
We start with the recently conjectured 3d bosonization dualities and gauge global symmetries to generate an infinite sequence of new dualities. These equate theories with non-Abelian product gauge groups and bifundamental matter. We uncover examples of Bose/Bose and Fermi/Fermi dualities, as well as a sequence of dualities between theories with scalar matter in two-index representations. Our conjectures are consistent with level/rank duality in massive phases.
We compute the thermodynamic properties of the Sachdev-Ye-Kitaev (SYK) models of fermions with a conserved fermion number, $\mathcal{Q}$. We extend a previously proposed Schwarzian effective action to include a phase field, and this describes the low temperature energy and $\mathcal{Q}$ fluctuations. We obtain higher-dimensional generalizations of the SYK models which display disordered metallic states without quasiparticle excitations, and we deduce their thermoelectric transport coefficients. We also examine the corresponding properties of Einstein-Maxwell-scalar theories on black brane geometries which interpolate from either AdS$_4$ or AdS$_5$ to an AdS$_2\times \mathbb{R}^2$ or AdS$_2\times \mathbb{R}^3$ near-horizon geometry. These provide holographic descriptions of non-quasiparticle metallic states without momentum conservation. We find a precise match between low temperature transport and thermodynamics of the SYK and holographic models. In both models the Seebeck transport coefficient is exactly equal to the $\mathcal{Q}$-derivative of the entropy. For the SYK models, quantum chaos, as characterized by the butterfly velocity and the Lyapunov rate, universally determines the thermal diffusivity, but not the charge diffusivity.
We revisit AdS$_2$ holography with the Sachdev-Ye-Kitaev models in mind. Our main result is to rewrite a generic theory of gravity near an AdS$_2$ throat as a novel hydrodynamics coupled to the correlation functions of a conformal quantum mechanics. This gives a prescription for the computation of $n$-point functions in the dual quantum mechanics. We thereby find that the dual is maximally chaotic.
Employing a conformal map to hyperbolic space cross a circle, we compute the universal contribution to the vacuum entanglement entropy (EE) across a sphere in even-dimensional conformal field theory. Previous attempts to derive the EE in this way were hindered by a lack of knowledge of the appropriate boundary terms in the trace anomaly. In this paper we show that the universal part of the EE can be treated as a purely boundary effect. As a byproduct of our computation, we derive an explicit form for the A-type anomaly contribution to the Wess-Zumino term for the trace anomaly, now including boundary terms. In d=4 and 6, these boundary terms generalize earlier bulk actions derived in the literature.
A conformal field theory (CFT) in dimension $d\geq 3$ coupled to a planar, two-dimensional, conformal defect is characterized in part by a "central charge" $b$ that multiplies the Euler density in the defect's Weyl anomaly. For defect renormalization group flows, under which the bulk remains critical, we use reflection positivity to show that $b$ must decrease or remain constant from ultraviolet to infrared. Our result applies also to a CFT in $d=3$ flat space with a planar boundary.
We consider quantum Hall states on a space with boundary, focusing on the aspects of the edge physics which are completely determined by the symmetries of the problem. There are four distinct terms of Chern-Simons type that appear in the low-energy effective action of the state. Two of these protect gapless edge modes. They describe Hall conductance and, with some provisions, thermal Hall conductance. The remaining two, including the Wen-Zee term, which contributes to the Hall viscosity, do not protect gapless edge modes but are instead related to local boundary response fixed by symmetries. We highlight some basic features of this response. It follows that the coefficient of the Wen-Zee term can change across an interface without closing a gap or breaking a symmetry.
We show that the full spurionic symmetry of Galilean-invariant field theories can be deduced when those theories are the limits of relativistic parents. Under the limit, the non-relativistic daughter couples to Newton-Cartan geometry together with all of the symmetries advocated in previous work, including the recently revived Milne boosts. Our limit is a covariant version of the usual one, where we start with a gapped relativistic theory with a conserved charge, turn on a chemical potential equal to the rest mass of the lightest charged state, and then zoom in to the low energy sector. This procedure gives a simple physical interpretation for the Milne boosts. Our methods even apply when there is a magnetic moment, which is known to modify the non-relativistic symmetry transformations. We focus on two examples, taking the non-relativistic limits of scalar field theory and hydrodynamics.
We reconsider general aspects of Galilean-invariant thermal field theory. Using the proposal of our companion paper, we recast non-relativistic hydrodynamics in a manifestly covariant way and couple it to a background spacetime. We examine the concomitant consequences for the thermal partition functions of Galilean theories on a time-independent, but weakly curved background. We work out both the hydrodynamics and partition functions in detail for the example of parity-violating normal fluids in two dimensions to first order in the gradient expansion, finding results that differ from those previously reported in the literature. As for relativistic field theories, the equality-type constraints imposed by the existence of an entropy current appear to be in one-to-one correspondence with those arising from the existence of a hydrostatic partition function. Along the way, we obtain a number of useful results about non-relativistic hydrodynamics, including a manifestly boost-invariant presentation thereof, simplified Ward identities, the systematics of redefinitions of the fluid variables, and the positivity of entropy production.
In previous work, two of us constructed the holographic dual of a single Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen (EPR) pair in maximally supersymmetric Yang-Mills theory. Here we extend that work in two directions. First, we use a Randall-Sundrum brane to couple the entangled pair to dynamical gravity. Second, we consider the entangled pair in the background of a black hole with the particles on opposite sides of the horizon, turning the EPR pair into a Hawking pair. We give general arguments that ER=EPR should be understood as a duality between two equivalent descriptions of the same physical reality.
In this essay, we consider highly entangled states in theories with a gravity dual, where the entangled degrees of freedom are causally disconnected from each other. Using the basic rules of holography, we argue that there is a non-traversable wormhole in the gravity dual whose geometry encodes the pattern of the entanglement.
We study a number of (3+1)- and (2+1)-dimensional defect and boundary conformal field theories holographically dual to supergravity theories. In all cases the defects or boundaries are planar, and the defects are codimension-one. Using holography, we compute the entanglement entropy of a (hemi-)spherical region centered on the defect (boundary). We define defect and boundary entropies from the entanglement entropy by an appropriate background subtraction. For some (3+1)-dimensional theories we find evidence that the defect/boundary entropy changes monotonically under certain renormalization group flows triggered by operators localized at the defect or boundary. This provides evidence that the g-theorem of (1+1)-dimensional field theories generalizes to higher dimensions.
We compute the full contribution of flavor and (or) Lorentz anomalies to the thermodynamic partition function. Apart from the Wess-Zumino consistency condition the Euclidean generating function must satisfy an extra requirement which we refer to as `consistency with the Euclidean vacuum.' The latter requirement fixes all Chern-Simons terms that arise in a particular Kaluza-Klein reduction of the theory. The solution to both conditions may be encoded in a `thermal anomaly polynomial' which we compute. Our construction fixes all the thermodynamic response parameters of a hydrodynamic theory associated with anomalies.
Using the anomaly inflow mechanism, we compute the flavor/Lorentz non-invariant contribution to the partition function in a background with a U(1) isometry. This contribution is a local functional of the background fields. By identifying the U(1) isometry with Euclidean time we obtain a contribution of the anomaly to the thermodynamic partition function from which hydrostatic correlators can be efficiently computed. Our result is in line with, and an extension of, previous studies on the role of anomalies in a hydrodynamic setting. Along the way we find simplified expressions for Bardeen-Zumino polynomials and various transgression formulae