arXiv subjects

Willy Fischler

Publications and source records attributed to Willy Fischler.

At least 19 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2026

Matrix Multiverses Meet Multiple Mythologies

We present a model in which asymptotically de Sitter universes of various types, and de Sitter (dS) radii $R_n$, live in the interiors of black holes in a maximally entropic flat $p = \rho$ Friedmann-Robertson-Walker universe. These dS universes clearly have many quantum states. We argue that they decay and equilibrate with the maximal entropy universe on time scales of order $\alpha_n R_n {\rm ln} (R_n /\delta_n)$, where $\alpha_n$ are model-dependent dimensionless constants and $\delta_n$ are the initial distances between the shell, satisfying the Israel junction conditions, and the dS horizon. These are time-scales as viewed by a detector following a trajectory far from the would-be cosmological horizon. These times are all exponentially shorter than dS recurrence times, which have no meaning in this model. It is impossible for a detector inside one of the dS universes to determine whether it is actually part of such a structure. This model could be used as the basis for claiming that certain constants of nature or cosmological initial conditions were chosen to have mathematically unnatural values because other values could not lead to any form of intelligent life.

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arXiv2026

Can Primordial Black Holes Be Seeds for Early Galaxies in Models Satisfying the Covariant Entropy Bound?

We argue that cosmological models obeying the Covariant Entropy Bound (CEB) mathematically favor states with no localized excitations or one large black hole containing all the energy in a constrained initial state. In order to get a long radiation-dominated era, one must postulate that at a very early time, most horizon volumes of the universe contained tiny black holes that decayed into radiation. A previous work by two of the authors showed that such a scenario could fit the data on the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB). In order to account for dark matter, we also postulate some random black holes of at least horizon size at that time. A reasonable distribution of such primordial black holes can account for all of dark matter as well as the early galaxies seen by the James Webb Space Telescope. Some of the dark matter may also be in Planck-scale remnants of the decaying black holes. We describe our model both in terms of approximate solutions to General Relativity and a speculative quantum gravity model whose hydrodynamics matches the flat $p = \pm \rho$ FRW model that saturates the CEB.

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arXiv2026

Proposal to Search for the CP Violating Electromagnetic Vacuum Angle at the Event Horizon Telescope

We examine the possibility that evidence for a non-zero value of the CP violating $ \frac{e^2 }{32\pi^2}\theta_{EM} \int d^4 x {\vec E}\cdot {\vec B}$ coupling might be extracted from Event Horizon Telescope observations of the black holes SgA* and M87*. The Fischler-Kundu\cite{FK} effect predicts a universal Hall current in the relaxation of charge falling onto the black hole horizon. We argue that this leads to a non-zero value of a certain CP-violating observable ${\cal C}$, defined below. The effect can be masked by parity violating plasma currents. In particular, evidence for polarization flips \cite{flip} in the signals from M87* indicate strong plasma effects in the data. We suggest that time averaging the data over periods including the flip might leave over a residual that would be an indicator of the FK signal. In addition, similarities in the polarization patterns between the two very different black holes, and a part of the signal that is uniform in frequency, might enable us to distinguish the universal topological signal from source and frequency dependent plasma effects. Current data does not appear to be sufficient to perform such a test.

astro-ph.HE↗

arXiv2025

Seeing double: shock waves and the de Sitter horizon

We consider a de Sitter observer in his rest frame at late times who observes a particle slightly displaced from unstable equilibrium. Initially, the observer notices an axisymmetric and parity-violating deformation along the trajectory of the displaced particle of his cosmological horizon. On a time scale of order $\ell$, the de Sitter radius, the particle is nearly absorbed by the cosmological horizon and has been accelerated to an ultra-relativistic speed and thus is well approximated as a shock wave. In the shock wave limit, the observer sees an axisymmetric deformation of his horizon with parity restored, which we interpret as arising due to a particle from the complementary static patch. We comment on the holographic implications of this result and note that there is no need to extend the holographic screen of de Sitter spacetime beyond the empty static patch to account for this signal.

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arXiv2024

There is more to the de Sitter horizon than just the area

It is well known that the area of the de Sitter cosmological horizon is related to the entropy of the bulk spacetime. Recent work has however shown that the horizon encodes more information about the bulk spacetime than just the entropy. In this work, we show that the horizon contains all of the gauge invariant (diffeomorphism and $U(1)$) information about (static albeit unstable) configurations of charged and rotating objects placed deep inside the de Sitter spacetime. We study highly symmetric objects, such as dipoles and cubes, built of objects with electric charge and angular momentum at their vertices. We show how these configurations affect the geometry of the cosmological horizon and imprint detailed information about the objects in the bulk onto the cosmological horizon.

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arXiv2024

Plato Meets de Sitter, or de Sitter's Allegory of the Cave

Configurations of masses located at the vertices of Platonic solids deep within the bulk of de Sitter spacetime generate deformations of the cosmological horizon with the geometry dual to these polyhedra. The horizon data encodes both the symmetries and sizes of the solids in the bulk.

hep-th↗

arXiv2024

Holographic Inflation, Primordial Black Holes and Early Structure Formation

Evidence has accumulated that there are supermassive black holes (SMBHs) in the centers of most galaxies, and that these were formed in the very early universe by some as yet unknown process. In particular, there is evidence [15] that at least some galaxies formed as early as $10^8$ to $10^9$ years after the Big Bang host SMBHs. We suggest that the holographic model of inflation, whose dark matter candidates are primordial black holes carrying a discrete gauge charge, which originated as a small subset of the inflationary horizon volumes in the very early universe, can provide the seeds for this early structure formation. Aspects of the model pointed out long ago suggested an early era of structure formation, with structures dominated by dark matter. The additional assumption that the dark matter consists of discretely charged black holes implies black hole dominance of early structures, which seems to be implied by JWST data.

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arXiv2023

Quantum theory of three-dimensional de Sitter space

We sketch the construction of a quantum model of 3 dimensional de Sitter space, based on the Covariant Entropy Principle and the observation that semi-classical physics suggests the possibility of a consistent theory of a finite number of unstable massive particles with purely gravitational interactions. Our model is holographic, finite, unitary, causal, plausibly exhibits fast scrambling, and qualitatively reproduces features of semi-classical de Sitter physics. In an appendix we outline some calculations that might lead to further tests of the model.

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arXiv2023

Quantum Error Correction in the Lowest Landau Level

We develop finite-dimensional versions of the quantum error-correcting codes proposed by Albert, Covey, and Preskill (ACP) for continuous-variable quantum computation on configuration spaces with nonabelian symmetry groups. Our codes can be realized by a charged particle in a Landau level on a spherical geometry -- in contrast to the planar Landau level realization of the qudit codes of Gottesman, Kitaev, and Preskill (GKP) -- or more generally by spin coherent states. Our quantum error-correction scheme is inherently approximate, and the encoded states may be easier to prepare than those of GKP or ACP.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2022

Membrane nucleation rates from holography

Membrane nucleation, a higher dimensional analog of the Schwinger effect, is a useful toy model for vacuum decay. While a non-perturbative effect, the computation of nucleation rates has only been accomplished at weak coupling in the field theory. Here we compute the nucleation rates of spherical membranes using AdS/CFT duality, thus naturally including the effects of strong coupling. More precisely, we consider the nucleation of spherical membranes coupled to an antisymmetric tensor field, a process which renders the vacuum unstable above a critical value of the field strength. We analyze membrane creation in flat and de Sitter space using various foliations of AdS. This is accomplished via instanton methods, where the rate of nucleation is dominated by the semi-classical on-shell Euclidean action. Our findings generalize the holographic Schwinger effect and provide a step toward holographic false vacuum decay mediated by Coleman-De Luccia instantons.

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arXiv2021

Quantum chaos in a weakly-coupled field theory with nonlocality

In order to study the chaotic behavior of a system with non-local interactions, we will consider weakly coupled non-commutative field theories. We compute the Lyapunov exponent of this exponential growth in the large Moyal-scale limit to leading order in the t'Hooft coupling and $1/N$. We found that in this limit, the Lyapunov exponent remains comparable in magnitude to (and somewhat smaller than) the exponent in the commutative case. This can possibly be explained by the infrared sensitivity of the Lyapunov exponent. Another possible explanation is that in examples of weakly coupled non-commutative field theories, non-local contributions to various thermodynamic quantities are sub-dominant.

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arXiv2021

Entropy and Black Holes in the Very Early Universe

Model independent arguments following from the Covariant Entropy Principle imply that causal diamonds in the very early universe were entirely filled with a single equilibrated system with finite entropy. A universe where this condition persists forever has no localized excitations. Our own universe appears to be headed toward such a state. Within a few hundred times its current age it will approach a state where our local group of galaxies sit in empty de Sitter space. Eventually, the local group collapse into a black hole, which evaporates. Localized excitations in de Sitter space are low entropy constrained states of the vacuum ensemble. The origin of these constraints must be in the early universe: the apparent horizon must expand after some initial period, in a constrained state that is the origin of all localized excitations in the universe. We argue that in global FRW coordinates, this corresponds to slow roll inflation that ends in a dilute gas of tiny black holes, with mass determined by the inflationary scale. We then review arguments that these black holes can account for the Hot Big Bang, baryogenesis, a distinctive pattern of CMB fluctuations, and possibly primordial black hole dark matter consisting of larger black holes that survive until the matter dominated era. The more complicated question of whether these small black holes can evolve in a way that is consistent with all observational constraints requires computer simulations that have not yet been done.

hep-th↗

arXiv2021

Speeding up the spread of quantum information in chaotic systems

We explore the effect of introducing mild nonlocality into otherwise local, chaotic quantum systems, on the rate of information spreading and associated rates of entanglement generation and operator growth. We consider various forms of nonlocality, both in 1-dimensional spin chain models and in holographic gauge theories, comparing the phenomenology of each. Generically, increasing the level of nonlocality increases the rate of information spreading, but in lattice models we find instances where these rates are slightly suppressed.

hep-th↗

arXiv2021

Chaos and entanglement spreading in a non-commutative gauge theory

Holographic theories with classical gravity duals are maximally chaotic: they saturate a set of bounds on the spread of quantum information. In this paper we question whether non-locality can affect such bounds. Specifically, we consider the gravity dual of a prototypical theory with non-local interactions, namely, $\mathcal{N}=4$ non-commutative super Yang Mills. We construct shock waves geometries that correspond to perturbations of the thermofield double state with definite momentum and study several chaos related properties of the theory, including the butterfly velocity, the entanglement velocity, the scrambling time and the maximal Lyapunov exponent. The latter two are unaffected by the non-commutative parameter $θ$, however, both the butterfly and entanglement velocities increase with the strength of the non-commutativity. This implies that non-local interactions can enhance the effective light-cone for the transfer of quantum information, eluding previously conjectured bounds encountered in the context of local quantum field theory. We comment on a possible limitation on the retrieval of quantum information imposed by non-locality.

hep-th↗

arXiv2020

Primordial Black Holes as Dark Matter

We investigate models in which a spectrum of black holes with Hawking temperature of order the radiation temperature at the beginning of the radiation dominated era can survive long enough to produce a matter dominated era at the observed crossover between matter and radiation in our universe. We find that a sufficiently dense population of such black holes can indeed do so. The stronger observational constraint, that the black holes have lifetimes at least as long as the current age of the universe is harder to assess, because of black hole mergers during the matter dominated era. We then investigate whether the required densities and masses are consistent with the Holographic Space-time (HST) model of inflation. We find that they are, but put mild constraints on the slow roll parameter $ε= - \frac{\dot{H}}{H^2}$ in that model to be small. The bound is no stronger than the observational bound on the model's prediction for tensor fluctuations. The required black hole density, at the reheat temperature, in a model with a single species of black hole, must be viewed as a quantum mechanical accident. In such a model, our universe exists because of a low probability quantum fluctuation.

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arXiv2020

Holographic Space-time, Newton`s Law, and the Dynamics of Horizons

We revisit the construction of models of quantum gravity in d dimensional Minkowski space in terms of random tensor models, and correct some mistakes in our previous treatment of the subject. We find a large class of models in which the large impact parameter scattering scales with energy and impact parameter like Newton`s law. The scattering amplitudes in these models describe scattering of jets of particles, and also include amplitudes for the production of highly meta-stable states with all the parametric properties of black holes. These models have emergent energy, momentum and angular conservation laws, despite being based on time dependent Hamiltonians. The scattering amplitudes in which no intermediate black holes are produced have a time-ordered Feynman diagram space-time structure: local interaction vertices connected by propagation of free particles (really Sterman-Weinberg jets of particles). However, there are also amplitudes where jets collide to form large meta-stable objects, with all the scaling properties of black holes: energy, entropy and temperature, as well as the characteristic time scale for the decay of perturbations. We generalize the conjecture of Sekino and Susskind, to claim that all of these models are fast scramblers. The rationale for this claim is that the interactions are invariant under fuzzy subgroups of the group of volume preserving diffeomorphisms, so that they are highly non-local on the holographic screen. We review how this formalism resolves the Firewall Paradox.

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arXiv2020

Holographic Theory of Accelerated Observers, the S-matrix, and the Emergence of Effective Field Theory

We present a theory of accelerated observers in the formalism of holographic space time, and show how to define the analog of the Unruh effect for a one parameter set of accelerated observers in a causal diamond in Minkowski space. The key fact is that the formalism splits the degrees of freedom in a large causal diamond into particles and excitations on the horizon. The latter form a large heat bath for the particles, and different Hamiltonians, describing a one parameter family of accelerated trajectories, have different couplings to the bath. We argue that for a large but finite causal diamond the Hamiltonian describing a geodesic observer has a residual coupling to the bath and that the effect of the bath is finite over the long time interval in the diamond. We find general forms of the Hamiltonian, which guarantee that the horizon degrees of freedom will decouple in the limit of large diamonds, leaving over a unitary evolution operator for particles, with an asymptotically conserved energy. That operator converges to the S-matrix in the infinite diamond limit. The S-matrix thus arises from integrating out the horizon degrees of freedom, in a manner reminiscent of, but distinct from, Matrix Theory. We note that this model for the S-matrix implies that Quantum Gravity, as opposed to quantum field theory, has a natural adiabatic switching off of the interactions. We argue that imposing Lorentz invariance on the S-matrix is natural, and guarantees super-Poincare invariance in the HST formalism. Spatial translation invariance is seen to be the residuum of the consistency conditions of HST.

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arXiv2019

Holographic Purification Complexity

We study holographic subregion complexity, and its possible connection to purification complexity suggested recently by Agón et al. In particular, we study the conjecture that subregion complexity is the purification complexity by considering holographic purifications of a holographic mixed state. We argue that these include states with any amount of coarse-graining consistent with being a purification of the mixed state in question, corresponding holographically to different choices of the cutoff surface. We find that within the complexity = volume and complexity = spacetime volume conjectures, the subregion complexity is equal to the holographic purification complexity. For complexity = action, the subregion complexity seems to provide an upper bound on the holographic purification complexity, though we show cases where this bound is not saturated. One such example is provided by black holes with a large genus behind the horizon, which were studied by Fu et al. As such, one must conclude that these offending geometries are not holographic, that CA must be modified, or else that holographic subregion complexity in CA is not dual to the purification complexity of the corresponding reduced state.

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