arXiv subjects

Troels Harmark

Publications and source records attributed to Troels Harmark.

At least 55 records · Page 3Linked to original sources

arXiv2014

Constraints on the effective fluid theory of stationary branes

We develop further the effective fluid theory of stationary branes. This formalism applies to stationary blackfolds as well as to other equilibrium brane systems at finite temperature. The effective theory is described by a Lagrangian containing the information about the elastic dynamics of the brane embedding as well as the hydrodynamics of the effective fluid living on the brane. The Lagrangian is corrected order-by-order in a derivative expansion, where we take into account the dipole moment of the brane which encompasses finite-thickness corrections, including transverse spin. We describe how to extract the thermodynamics from the Lagrangian and we obtain constraints on the higher-derivative terms with one and two derivatives. These constraints follow by comparing the brane thermodynamics with the conserved currents associated with background Killing vector fields. In particular, we fix uniquely the one- and two-derivative terms describing the coupling of the transverse spin to the background space-time. Finally, we apply our formalism to two blackfold examples, the black tori and charged black rings and compare the latter to a numerically generated solution.

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arXiv2013

Thermal DBI action for the D3-brane at weak and strong coupling

We study the effective action for finite-temperature D3-branes with an electromagnetic field at weak and strong coupling. We call this action the thermal DBI action. Comparing at low temperature the leading $T^4$ correction for the thermal DBI action at weak and strong coupling we find that the $3/4$ factor well-known from the AdS/CFT correspondence extends to the case of arbitrary electric and magnetic fields on the D3-brane. We investigate the reason for this by taking the decoupling limit in both the open and the closed string descriptions thus showing that the AdS/CFT correspondence extends to the case of arbitrary constant electric and magnetic fields on the D3-brane.

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arXiv2012

Thermal Giant Gravitons

We study the giant graviton solution as the AdS_5 X S^5 background is heated up to finite temperature. The analysis employs the thermal brane probe technique based on the blackfold approach. We focus mainly on the thermal giant graviton corresponding to a thermal D3-brane probe wrapped on an S^3 moving on the S^5 of the background at finite temperature. We find several interesting new effects, including that the thermal giant graviton has a minimal possible value for the angular momentum and correspondingly also a minimal possible radius of the S^3. We compute the free energy of the thermal giant graviton in the low temperature regime, which potentially could be compared to that of a thermal state on the gauge theory side. Moreover, we analyze the space of solutions and stability of the thermal giant graviton and find that, in parallel with the extremal case, there are two available solutions for a given temperature and angular momentum, one stable and one unstable. In order to write down the equations of motion, action and conserved charges for the thermal giant graviton we present a slight generalization of the blackfold formalism for charged black branes. Finally, we also briefly consider the thermal giant graviton moving in the AdS_5 part.

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arXiv2012

Holographic 3-point function at one loop

We explore the recent weak/strong coupling match of three-point functions in the AdS/CFT correspondence for two semi-classical operators and one light chiral primary operator found by Escobedo et al. This match is between the tree-level three-point function with the two semi-classical operators described by coherent states while on the string side the three-point function is found in the Frolov-Tseytlin limit. We compute the one-loop correction to the three-point function on the gauge theory side and compare this to the corresponding correction on the string theory side. We find that the corrections do not match. Finally, we discuss the possibility of further contributions on the gauge theory side that can alter our results.

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arXiv2012

Domain Structure of Black Hole Space-Times with a Cosmological Constant

We generalize the domain structure for stationary black hole space-times to include asymptotically de Sitter and Anti-de Sitter space-times. Given a set of commuting Killing vector fields of a space-time the domain structure lives on the submanifold of the orbit space on which at least one of the Killing vector fields has zero norm. In general the domain structure provides topological and geometrical invariants of black hole space-times that in specific cases have proven to be a crucial part of a full characterization leading to uniqueness theorems. In four and five dimensions the domain structure generalizes the rod structure. We examine in detail the domain structure for four, five, six and seven-dimensional black hole space-times including a very general class of spherically symmetric and static black hole space-times as well as the exact solutions for Kerr-(Anti)-de Sitter black holes. While for asymptotically Anti-de Sitter space-times the domain structures resemble that of asymptotically flat space-times, the domain structures of asymptotically de Sitter space-times are shown to be compact. Finally, we find under certain assumptions that the horizon topologies for four- and five-dimensional black holes are restricted by our domain structure analysis.

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arXiv2012

The Young Modulus of Black Strings and the Fine Structure of Blackfolds

We explore corrections in the blackfold approach, which is a worldvolume theory capturing the dynamics of thin black branes. The corrections probe the fine structure of the branes, going beyond the approximation in which they are infinitely thin, and account for the dipole moment of worldvolume stress-energy as well as the internal spin degrees of freedom. We show that the dipole correction is induced elastically by bending a black brane. We argue that the long-wavelength linear response coefficient capturing this effect is a relativistic generalization of the Young modulus of elastic materials and we compute it analytically. Using this we draw predictions for black rings in dimensions greater than six. Furthermore, we employ our corrected blackfold equations to various multi-spinning black hole configurations in the blackfold limit, finding perfect agreement with known analytic solutions.

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arXiv2012

Thermal string probes in AdS and finite temperature Wilson loops

We apply a new description of thermal fundamental string probes to the study of finite temperature Wilson loops in the context of the AdS/CFT correspondence. Previously this problem has been considered using extremal probes even though the background is at finite temperature. The new description of fundamental string probes is based on the blackfold approach. As a result of our analysis we find a new term in the potential between static quarks in the symmetric representation which for sufficiently small temperatures is the leading correction to the Coulomb force potential. We also find an order 1/N correction to the onset of the Debye screening of the quarks. These effects arise from including the thermal excitations of the string probe and demanding the probe to be in thermodynamic equilibrium with the Anti-de Sitter black hole background.

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arXiv2011

Blackfolds in Supergravity and String Theory

We develop the effective worldvolume theory for the dynamics of black branes with charges of the kind that arise in many supergravities and low-energy limits of string theory. Using this theory, we construct numerous new rotating black holes with charges and dipoles of D-branes, fundamental strings and other branes. In some instances, the black holes can be dynamically stable close enough to extremality. Some of these black holes, such as those based on the D1-D5-P system, have extremal, non-supersymmetric limits with regular horizons of finite area and a wide variety of horizon topologies and geometries.

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arXiv2011

Finite-size corrections for quantum strings on AdS_4 x CP^3

We revisit the calculation of curvature corrections to the pp-wave energy of type IIA string states on AdS_4 x CP^3 initiated in arXiv:0807.1527. Using the near pp-wave Hamiltonian found in arXiv:0912.2257, we compute the first non-vanishing correction to the energy of a set of bosonic string states at order 1/R^2, where R is the curvature radius of the background. The leading curvature corrections give rise to cubic, order 1/R, and quartic, order 1/R^2, terms in the Hamiltonian, for which we implement the appropriate normal ordering prescription. Including the contributions from all possible fermionic and bosonic string states, we find that there exist logarithmic divergences in the sums over mode numbers which cancel between the cubic and quartic Hamiltonian. We show that the cubic Hamiltonian naturally requires that the cutoff for summing over heavy modes must be twice the one for light modes. With this prescription the strong-weak coupling interpolating function h(λ), entering the magnon dispersion relation, does not receive a one-loop correction, in agreement with the algebraic curve spectrum. However, the single magnon dispersion relation exhibits finite-size exponential corrections.

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arXiv2011

Heating up the BIon

We propose a new method to consider D-brane probes in thermal backgrounds. The method builds on the recently developed blackfold approach to higher-dimensional black holes. While D-brane probes in zero-temperature backgrounds are well-described by the Dirac-Born-Infeld (DBI) action, this method addresses how to probe thermal backgrounds. A particularly important feature is that the probe is in thermal equilibrium with the background. We apply our new method to study the thermal generalization of the BIon solution of the DBI action. The BIon solution is a configuration in flat space of a D-brane and a parallel anti-D-brane connected by a wormhole with F-string charge. In our thermal generalization, we put this configuration in hot flat space. We find that the finite temperature system behaves qualitatively different than its zero-temperature counterpart. In particular, for a given separation between the D-brane and anti-D-brane, while at zero temperature there are two phases, at finite temperature there are either one or three phases available.

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arXiv2011

Thermodynamics of the hot BIon

We investigate the thermodynamics of the recently obtained finite temperature BIon solution of arXiv:1012.1494, focusing on two aspects. The first concerns comparison of the free energy of the three available phases for the finite temperature brane-antibrane wormhole configuration. Based on this we propose a heuristic picture for the dynamics of the phases that involves a critical temperature below which a stable phase exists. This stable phase is the finite temperature analogue of the thin throat branch of the extremal brane anti-brane wormhole configuration. The second aspect that we consider is the possibility of constructing a finite temperature generalization of the infinite spike configuration of the extremal BIon. To this end we identify a correspondence point at the end of the throat where the thermodynamics of the D3-F1 blackfold configuration can be matched to that of k non-extremal black fundamental strings.

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arXiv2010

Uniqueness Theorem for Black Hole Space-Times with Multiple Disconnected Horizons

We show uniqueness of stationary and asymptotically flat black hole space-times with multiple disconnected horizons and with two rotational Killing vector fields in the context of five-dimensional minimal supergravity (Einstein-Maxwell-Chern-Simons gravity). The novelty in this work is the introduction in the uniqueness theorem of intrinsic local charges measured near each horizon as well as the measurement of local fluxes besides the asymptotic charges that characterize a particular solution. A systematic method of defining the boundary conditions on the fields that specify a black hole space-time is given based on the study of its rod structure (domain structure). Also, an analysis of known solutions with disconnected horizons is carried out as an example of an application of this theorem.

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arXiv2010

Full Lagrangian and Hamiltonian for quantum strings on AdS_4 x CP^3 in a near plane wave limit

We find the full interacting Lagrangian and Hamiltonian for quantum strings in a near plane wave limit of AdS_4 x CP^3. The leading curvature corrections give rise to cubic and quartic terms in the Lagrangian and Hamiltonian that we compute in full. The Lagrangian is found as the type IIA Green-Schwarz superstring in the light-cone gauge employing a superspace construction with 32 grassmann-odd coordinates. The light-cone gauge for the fermions is non-trivial since it should commute with the supersymmetry condition. We provide a prescription to properly fix the kappa-symmetry gauge condition to make it consistent with light-cone gauge. We use fermionic field redefinitions to find a simpler Lagrangian. To construct the Hamiltonian a Dirac procedure is needed in order to properly keep into account the fermionic second class constraints. We combine the field redefinition with a shift of the fermionic phase space variables that reduces Dirac brackets to Poisson brackets. This results in a completely well-defined and explicit expression for the full interacting Hamiltonian up to and including terms quartic in the number of fields.

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arXiv2010

New Horizons for Black Holes and Branes

We initiate a systematic scan of the landscape of black holes in any spacetime dimension using the recently proposed blackfold effective worldvolume theory. We focus primarily on asymptotically flat stationary vacuum solutions, where we uncover large classes of new black holes. These include helical black strings and black rings, black odd-spheres, for which the horizon is a product of a large and a small sphere, and non-uniform black cylinders. More exotic possibilities are also outlined. The blackfold description recovers correctly the ultraspinning Myers-Perry black holes as ellipsoidal even-ball configurations where the velocity field approaches the speed of light at the boundary of the ball. Helical black ring solutions provide the first instance of asymptotically flat black holes in more than four dimensions with a single spatial U(1) isometry. They also imply infinite rational non-uniqueness in ultraspinning regimes, where they maximize the entropy among all stationary single-horizon solutions. Moreover, static blackfolds are possible with the geometry of minimal surfaces. The absence of compact embedded minimal surfaces in Euclidean space is consistent with the uniqueness theorem of static black holes.

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arXiv2009

New Penrose Limits and AdS/CFT

We find a new Penrose limit of AdS_5 x S^5 giving the maximally supersymmetric pp-wave background with two explicit space-like isometries. This is an important missing piece in studying the AdS/CFT correspondence in certain subsectors. In particular whereas the Penrose limit giving one space-like isometry is useful for the SU(2) sector of N=4 SYM, this new Penrose limit is instead useful for studying the SU(2|3) and SU(1,2|3) sectors. In addition to the new Penrose limit of AdS_5 x S^5 we also find a new Penrose limit of AdS_4 x CP^3.

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arXiv2009

Essentials of Blackfold Dynamics

We develop and significantly generalize the effective worldvolume theory for higher-dimensional black holes recently proposed by the authors. The theory, which regards the black hole as a black brane curved into a submanifold of a background spacetime -a blackfold-, can be formulated in terms of an effective fluid that lives on a dynamical worldvolume. Thus the blackfold equations split into intrinsic (fluid-dynamical) equations, and extrinsic (generalized geodesic embedding) equations. The intrinsic equations can be easily solved for equilibrium configurations, thus providing an efficient formalism for the approximate construction of novel stationary black holes. Furthermore, it is possible to study time evolution. In particular, the long-wavelength component of the Gregory-Laflamme instability of black branes is obtained as a sound-mode instability of the effective fluid. We also discuss action principles, connections to black hole thermodynamics, and other consequences and possible extensions of the approach. Finally, we outline how the fluid/AdS-gravity correspondence is related to this formalism.

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arXiv2009

Domain Structure of Black Hole Space-Times

We introduce the domain structure for stationary black hole space-times. Given a set of commuting Killing vector fields of the space-time the domain structure lives on the submanifold where at least one of the Killing vector fields have zero norm. Depending on which Killing vector field has zero norm the submanifold is naturally divided into domains. A domain corresponds either to a set of fixed points of a spatial symmetry or to a Killing horizon, depending on whether the characterizing Killing vector field is space-like or time-like near the domain. The domain structure provides invariants of the space-time, both topological and geometrical. It is defined for any space-time dimension and any number of commuting Killing vector fields. We examine the domain structure for asymptotically flat space-times and find a canonical form for the metric of such space-times. The domain structure generalizes the rod structure introduced for space-times with D-2 commuting Killing vector fields. We analyze in detail the domain structure for Minkowski space, the Schwarzschild-Tangherlini black hole and the Myers-Perry black hole in six and seven dimensions. Finally we consider the possible domain structures for asymptotically flat black holes in six and seven dimensions.

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arXiv2009

World-Volume Effective Theory for Higher-Dimensional Black Holes

We argue that the main feature behind novel properties of higher-dimensional black holes, compared to four-dimensional ones, is that their horizons can have two characteristic lengths of very different size. We develop a long-distance worldvolume effective theory that captures the black hole dynamics at scales much larger than the short scale. In this limit the black hole is regarded as a blackfold: a black brane (possibly boosted locally) whose worldvolume spans a curved submanifold of the spacetime. This approach reveals black objects with novel horizon geometries and topologies more complex than the black ring, but more generally it provides a new organizing framework for the dynamics of higher-dimensional black holes.

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