Publications

Order by: publication date number of citations

• The hitchhiker's guide to 4d $\mathcal{N}=2$ superconformal field theories

  Mohammad Akhond, Guillermo Arias-Tamargo, Alessandro Mininno, Hao-Yu Sun, Zhengdi Sun, Yifan Wang, Fengjun Xu

  SciPost Phys. Lect. Notes 64 (2022) · published 26 October 2022 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  Superconformal field theory with $\mathcal{N}=2$ supersymmetry in four dimensional spacetime provides a prime playground to study strongly coupled phenomena in quantum field theory. Its rigid structure ensures valuable analytic control over non-perturbative effects, yet the theory is still flexible enough to incorporate a large landscape of quantum systems. Here we aim to offer a guidebook to fundamental features of the 4d $\mathcal{N}=2$ superconformal field theories and basic tools to construct them in string/M-/F-theory. The content is based on a series of lectures at the Quantum Field Theories and Geometry School (https://sites.google.com/view/qftandgeometrysummerschool/home) in July 2020.

  3 citations

• The Virasoro minimal string

  Scott Collier, Lorenz Eberhardt, Beatrix Muehlmann, Victor A. Rodriguez

  SciPost Phys. 16, 057 (2024) · published 26 February 2024 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We introduce a critical string theory in two dimensions and demonstrate that this theory, viewed as two-dimensional quantum gravity on the worldsheet, is equivalent to a double-scaled matrix integral. The worldsheet theory consists of Liouville CFT with central charge c$≥$ 25 coupled to timelike Liouville CFT with central charge 26-c. The double-scaled matrix integral has as its leading density of states the universal Cardy density of primaries in a two-dimensional CFT, thus motivating the name Virasoro minimal string. The duality holds for any value of the continuous parameter $c$ and reduces to the JT gravity/matrix integral duality in the large central charge limit. It thus provides a precise stringy realization of JT gravity. The main observables of the Virasoro minimal string are quantum analogues of the Weil-Petersson volumes, which are computed as absolutely convergent integrals of worldsheet CFT correlators over the moduli space of Riemann surfaces. By exploiting a relation of the Virasoro minimal string to three-dimensional gravity and intersection theory on the moduli space of Riemann surfaces, we are able to give a direct derivation of the duality. We provide many checks, such as explicit numerical - and in special cases, analytic - integration of string diagrams, the identification of the CFT boundary conditions with asymptotic boundaries of the two-dimensional spacetime, and the matching between the leading non-perturbative corrections of the worldsheet theory and the matrix integral. As a byproduct, we discover natural conformal boundary conditions for timelike Liouville CFT.

  3 citations

• Quantum walks on graphs of the ordered Hamming scheme and spin networks

  Hiroshi Miki, Satoshi Tsujimoto, Luc Vinet

  SciPost Phys. 7, 001 (2019) · published 2 July 2019 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  It is shown that the hopping of a single excitation on certain triangular spin lattices with non-uniform couplings and local magnetic fields can be described as the projections of quantum walks on graphs of the ordered Hamming scheme of depth 2. For some values of the parameters the models exhibit perfect state transfer between two summits of the lattice. Fractional revival is also observed in some instances. The bivariate Krawtchouk polynomials of the Tratnik type that form the eigenvalue matrices of the ordered Hamming scheme of depth 2 give the overlaps between the energy eigenstates and the occupational basis vectors.

  3 citations

• Hyperbolic string tadpole

  Atakan Hilmi Firat

  SciPost Phys. 15, 237 (2023) · published 13 December 2023 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  Hyperbolic geometry on the one-bordered torus is numerically uniformized using Liouville theory. This geometry is relevant for the hyperbolic string tadpole vertex describing the one-loop quantum corrections of closed string field theory. We argue that the Lamé equation, upon fixing its accessory parameter via Polyakov conjecture, provides the input for the characterization. The explicit expressions for the Weil-Petersson metric as well as the local coordinates and the associated vertex region for the tadpole vertex are given in terms of classical torus conformal blocks. The relevance of this vertex for vacuum shift computations in string theory is highlighted.

  3 citations

• Many-body Bell inequalities for bosonic qubits

  Jan Chwedenczuk

  SciPost Phys. Core 5, 025 (2022) · published 29 April 2022 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  Since John Bell formulated his paramount inequality for a pair of spin-$1/2$ particles, quantum mechanics has been confronted with the postulates of local realism with various equivalent configurations. Current technology, with its advanced manipulation and detection methods, allows to extend the Bell tests to more complex structures. The aim of this work is to analyze a set of Bell inequalities suitable for a possibly broad family of many-body systems with the focus on bosonic qubits. We develop a method that allows for a step-by-step study of the many-body Bell correlations, for instance among atoms forming a two-mode Bose-Einstein condensate or between photons obtained from the parametric-down conversion. The presented approach is valid both for cases of fixed and non-fixed number of particles, hence it allows for a thorough analysis of quantum correlations in a variety of many-body systems.

  3 citations

• A standard convention for particle-level Monte Carlo event-variation weights

  Enrico Bothmann, Andy Buckley, Christian Gütschow, Stefan Prestel, Marek Schönherr, Peter Skands, Jeppe R. Andersen, Saptaparna Bhattacharya, Jonathan Butterworth, Gurpreet Singh Chahal, Louie Corpe, Leif Gellersen, Matthew Gignac, Stefan Höche, Deepak Kar, Frank Krauss, Jan Kretzschmar, Leif Lönnblad, Josh McFayden, Andreas Papaefstathiou, Simon Plätzer, Steffen Schumann, Michael H. Seymour, Frank Siegert, Andrzej Siódmok

  SciPost Phys. Core 6, 007 (2023) · published 8 February 2023 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  Streams of event weights in particle-level Monte Carlo event generators are a convenient and immensely CPU-efficient approach to express systematic uncertainties in phenomenology calculations, providing systematic variations on the nominal prediction within a single event sample. But the lack of a common standard for labelling these variation streams across different tools has proven to be a major limitation for event-processing tools and analysers alike. Here we propose a well-defined, extensible community standard for the naming, ordering, and interpretation of weight streams that will serve as the basis for semantically correct parsing and combination of such variations in both theoretical and experimental studies.

  3 citations

• Scale-free non-Hermitian skin effect in a boundary-dissipated spin chain

  He-Ran Wang, Bo Li, Fei Song, Zhong Wang

  SciPost Phys. 15, 191 (2023) · published 13 November 2023 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We study the open XXZ spin chain with a $PT$-symmetric non-Hermitian boundary field. We find an interaction-induced scale-free non-Hermitian skin effect by using the coordinate Bethe Ansatz. The steady-state and the ground state in the $PT$ broken phase are constructed, and the formulas of their eigen-energies in the thermodynamic limit are obtained. The differences between the many-body scale-free states and the boundary string states are explored, and the transition between the two at the isotropic point is investigated. We also discuss an experimental scheme to verify our results.

  3 citations

• The representation theory of seam algebras

  Alexis Langlois-Rémillard, Yvan Saint-Aubin

  SciPost Phys. 8, 019 (2020) · published 5 February 2020 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  The boundary seam algebras $\mathsf{b}_{n,k}(\beta=q+q^{-1})$ were introduced by Morin-Duchesne, Ridout and Rasmussen to formulate algebraically a large class of boundary conditions for two-dimensional statistical loop models. The representation theory of these algebras $\mathsf{b}_{n,k}(\beta=q+q^{-1})$ is given: their irreducible, standard (cellular) and principal modules are constructed and their structure explicited in terms of their composition factors and of non-split short exact sequences. The dimensions of the irreducible modules and of the radicals of standard ones are also given. The methods proposed here might be applicable to a large family of algebras, for example to those introduced recently by Flores and Peltola, and Cramp\'e and Poulain d'Andecy.

  3 citations

• BROOD: Bilevel and Robust Optimization and Outlier Detection for Efficient Tuning of High-Energy Physics Event Generators

  Wenjing Wang, Mohan Krishnamoorthy, Juliane Muller, Stephen Mrenna, Holger Schulz, Xiangyang Ju, Sven Leyffer, Zachary Marshall

  SciPost Phys. Core 5, 001 (2022) · published 17 January 2022 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  The parameters in Monte Carlo (MC) event generators are tuned on experimental measurements by evaluating the goodness of fit between the data and the MC predictions. The relative importance of each measurement is adjusted manually in an often time-consuming, iterative process to meet different experimental needs. In this work, we introduce several optimization formulations and algorithms with new decision criteria for streamlining and automating this process. These algorithms are designed for two formulations: bilevel optimization and robust optimization. Both formulations are applied to the datasets used in the ATLAS A14 tune and to the dedicated hadronization datasets generated by the Sherpa generator, respectively. The corresponding tuned generator parameters are compared using three metrics. We compare the quality of our automatic tunes to the published ATLAS A14 tune. Moreover, we analyze the impact of a pre-processing step that excludes data that cannot be described by the physics models used in the MC event generators.

  3 citations

• Towards traversable wormholes from force-free plasmas

  Nabil Iqbal, Simon F. Ross

  SciPost Phys. 12, 086 (2022) · published 9 March 2022 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  The near-horizon region of magnetically charged black holes can have very strong magnetic fields. A useful low-energy effective theory for fluctuations of the fields, coupled to electrically charged particles, is force-free electrodynamics. The low energy collective excitations include a large number of Alfven wave modes, which have a massless dispersion relation along the field worldlines. We attempt to construct traversable wormhole solutions using the negative Casimir energy of the Alfven wave modes, analogously to the recent construction using charged massless fermions. The behaviour of massless scalars in the near-horizon region implies that the size of the wormholes is strongly restricted and cannot be made large, even though the force free description is valid in a larger regime.

  3 citations