119183237
Gauge theories, D-branes and holography
Abstract Based on a generalization of the string theoretic concept of D-brane probe, we propose a new approach to large N gauge theories which makes the holographic properties manifest. For any gauge theory, we define from first principles an effective action for a fixed number of “probe” D-branes in the presence of N “background” D-branes on which the gauge theory lives. This effective action is shown to encode all the information about the large N gauge theory. The analysis of the planar diagram expansion which computes the effective action yields a simple and generic mechanism explaining the emergence of holographic space dimensions: the probe D-branes move in a higher dimensional dual holographic space–time. The construction yields a new perspective on the notion of bulk space–time locality and draws unexpected links with some aspects of the 't Hooft Abelian projection ideas. It also provides a new non-perturbative approximation scheme, able to capture both the weak and strong coupling regimes. We sketchily illustrate the basic ideas on a few examples, including the pure four dimensional Yang–Mills theory.
119685691
Gravitational actions in two dimensions and the Mabuchi functional
Abstract The Mabuchi energy is an interesting geometric functional on the space of Kahler metrics that plays a crucial role in the study of the geometry of Kahler manifolds. We show that this functional, as well as other related geometric actions, contribute to the effective gravitational action when a massive scalar field is coupled to gravity in two dimensions in a small mass expansion. This yields new theories of two-dimensional quantum gravity generalizing the standard Liouville models.
1817006
Curves of marginal stability, and weak- and strong-coupling BPS spectra in N = 2 supersymmetric QCD
We explicitly determine the global structure of the SL(2, Z) bundle over the Coulomb branch of the moduli space of asymptotically free N = 2 supersymmetric Yang-Mills theories with gauge group SU(2) when massless hypermultiplets are present. For each relevant number of flavours, we show that there is a curve of marginal stability of the Coulomb branch, diffeomorphic to a circle, across which the BPS spectrum is discontinuous. We determine rigorously and completely the BPS spectra inside and outside the curve. In all cases, the spectrum inside the curve consists of only those BPS states that are responsible for the singularities of the low energy effective action (in addition to the massless abelian gauge multiplet which is always present). The predicted decay patterns across the curve of marginal stability are perfectly consistent with all quantum numbers carried by the BPS states. As a byproduct, we also show that the electric and magnetic quantum numbers of the massless states at the singularities proposed by Seiberg and Witten are the only possible ones.
15472365
Quantum parameter space and double scaling limits in N=1 super Yang-Mills theory
We study the physics of $\mathcal{N}=1$ super Yang-Mills theory with the gauge group $\mathrm{U}(N)$ and one adjoint Higgs field, by using the recently derived exact effective superpotentials. Interesting phenomena occur for some special values of the Higgs potential couplings. We find critical points with massless glueballs and/or massless monopoles, confinement without a mass gap, and tensionless domain walls. We describe the transitions between regimes with different patterns of gauge symmetry breaking, or, in the matrix model language, between solutions with a different number of cuts. The standard large N expansion is singular near the critical points, with domain wall tensions scaling as a fractional power of N. We argue that the critical points are four-dimensional analogues of the Kazakov critical points that are commonly found in low dimensional matrix integrals. We define a double scaling limit that yields the exact tension of BPS two-branes in the resulting $\mathcal{N}=1,$ four-dimensional noncritical string theory. D-brane states can be deformed continuously into closed string solitonic states, and vice versa, along paths that go over regions where the string coupling is strong.
119318242
Partial Gauge Fixing and Equivariant Cohomology
Given a gauge theory with gauge group G, it is sometimes useful to find an equivalent formulation in terms of a nontrivial gauge subgroup H⊂G. This amounts to fixing the gauge partially from G down to H. We study this problem systematically, both from the algebraic and from the path integral points of view. We find that the usual BRST cohomology must be replaced by an equivariant version and that the ghost Lagrangian must always include quartic ghost terms, even at tree level. Both the Cartan and Weil models for equivariant cohomology play a role and find natural interpretations within the physics framework. Applications include the construction of D-brane models of emergent space, the 't Hooft Abelian projection scenario in quantum chromodynamics and the formulation of the low-energy effective theories of grand unified models. © 2014 American Physical Society.
119574064
Multi-loop zeta function regularization and spectral cutoff in curved spacetime
Abstract We emphasize the close relationship between zeta function methods and arbitrary spectral cutoff regularizations in curved spacetime. This yields, on the one hand, a physically sound and mathematically rigorous justification of the standard zeta function regularization at one loop and, on the other hand, a natural generalization of this method to higher loops. In particular, to any Feynman diagram is associated a generalized meromorphic zeta function. For the one-loop vacuum diagram, it is directly related to the usual spectral zeta function. To any loop order, the renormalized amplitudes can be read off from the pole structure of the generalized zeta functions. We focus on scalar field theories and illustrate the general formalism by explicit calculations at one-loop and two-loop orders, including a two-loop evaluation of the conformal anomaly.
118564185
Dynamics of two topologically entangled chains
Starting from a given topological invariant, we argue that it is possible to construct a topological field theory with a finite number of Feynman diagrams and an amplitude of gauge invariant objects that is a function of that invariant. This is, for example, the case of the Gauss linking number and of the abelian BF models which have been already successfully applied in the statistical mechanics of polymers. In this work it is shown that a suitable generalization of the BF model can be applied also to polymer dynamics, where the polymer trajectories are not static, but change their shape during time.
119092707
Dirac quantization of the Chern-Simons field theory in the Coulomb gauge
Abstract In this letter the Chern-Simons field theories are studied in the Coulomb gauge using the Dirac's canonical formalism for constrained systems. As a strategy, we first work out the constraints and then quantize, replacing the Dirac brackets with quantum commutators. We find that the Chern-Simons field theories become two dimensional models with no propagation along the time direction. Moreover, we prove that, despite of the presence of non-trivial self-interactions in the gauge fixed functional, the commutation relations between the fields are trivial at any order in perturbation theory in the absence of couplings with matter fields. If these couplings are present, instead, the commutation relations become rather involved, but it is still possible to study their main properties and to show that they vanish at the tree level.
6484982
Chern–Simons field theories with non-semisimple gauge group of symmetry
The subject of this work is a class of Chern–Simons field theories with non-semisimple gauge group, which may well be considered as the most straightforward generalization of an Abelian Chern–Simons field theory. As a matter of fact, these theories, which are characterized by a non-semisimple group of gauge symmetry, have cubic interactions like those of non-Abelian Chern–Simons field theories, but are free from radiative corrections. Moreover, at the tree level in the perturbative expansion, there are only two connected tree diagrams, corresponding to the propagator and to the three vertex originating from the cubic interaction terms. For such theories it is derived here a set of BRST invariant observables, which lead to metric independent amplitudes. The vacuum expectation values of these observables can be computed exactly. From their expressions it is possible to isolate the Gauss linking number and an invariant of the Milnor type, which describes the topological relations among three or more closed c...
16431838
PERTURBATIVE ANALYSIS OF CHERN–SIMONS FIELD THEORY IN THE COULOMB GAUGE
In this paper, we analyse the perturbative aspects of Chern–Simons field theories in the Coulomb gauge. We show that in the perturbative expansion of the Green functions there are neither ultraviolet nor infrared divergences. Moreover, all the radiative corrections are zero at any loop order. Some problems connected with the Coulomb gauge fixing, like the appearance of spurious singularities in the computation of the Feynman diagrams, are discussed and solved. The regularization used here for the spurious singularities can be easily applied also to the Yang–Mills case, which is affected by similar divergences.
18747596
Polymers Entanglement and Chern-Simons Field Theory
In recent times some interesting field theoretical descriptions of the statistical mechanics of entangling polymers have been proposed by various authors. In these approaches, the dynamics of a single test polymer fluctuating in a background of static polymers is considered using mean-field type techniques. The extension to the case in which two or more polymers become dynamical is not straightforward unless severe constraints are imposed on the spatial configurations of the polymers. In this paper we present another approach, based on Chern– Simons field theory, which is able to describe the entanglement of two dynamical polymers in terms of gauge fields and second quantized replica fields. The work of F. Ferrari has been supported by the European Union, TMR Programme, under grant ERB4001GT951315 Laboratoire associé No. 280 au CNRS