Contributor info: Prof. Balt van Rees

Balt C. van Rees

SciPost Phys. 18, 207 (2025) · published 26 June 2025 | Toggle abstract · pdf

Consider a conformally covariant four-point function of identical scalar operators with a discrete spectrum, a twist gap, and compatible with the unitarity conditions. We give a mathematical proof confirming that the spectrum and OPE coefficients at large spin and fixed twist always become that of a generalized free field theory.

Marten Reehorst, Slava Rychkov, Benoit Sirois, Balt C. van Rees

SciPost Phys. 18, 060 (2025) · published 19 February 2025 | Toggle abstract · pdf

We study multiscalar theories with $\text{O}(N) × \text{O}(2)$ symmetry. These models have a stable fixed point in $d$ dimensions if $N$ is greater than some critical value $N_c(d)$. Previous estimates of this critical value from perturbative and non-perturbative renormalization group methods have produced mutually incompatible results. We use numerical conformal bootstrap methods to constrain $N_c(d)$ for $3 ≤ d < 4$. Our results show that $N_c> 3.78$ for $d = 3$. This favors the scenario that the physically relevant models with $N = 2,3$ in $d=3$ do not have a stable fixed point, indicating a first-order transition. Our result exemplifies how conformal windows can be rigorously constrained with modern numerical bootstrap algorithms.

Marten Reehorst, Slava Rychkov, David Simmons-Duffin, Benoit Sirois, Ning Su, Balt van Rees

SciPost Phys. 11, 072 (2021) · published 28 September 2021 | Toggle abstract · pdf

Current numerical conformal bootstrap techniques carve out islands in theory space by repeatedly checking whether points are allowed or excluded. We propose a new method for searching theory space that replaces the binary information “allowed”/“excluded” with a continuous “navigator” function that is negative in the allowed region and positive in the excluded region. Such a navigator function allows one to efficiently explore high-dimensional parameter spaces and smoothly sail towards any islands they may contain. The specific functions we introduce have several attractive features: they are well-defined in large regions of parameter space, can be computed with standard methods, and evaluation of their gradient is immediate due to an SDP gradient formula that we provide. The latter property allows for the use of efficient quasi-Newton optimization methods, which we illustrate by navigating towards the 3d Ising island.