1. Bootstrapping smooth conformal defects in Chern-Simons-matter theories.
- Author
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Gabai, Barak, Sever, Amit, and Zhong, De-liang
- Subjects
- *
CONFORMAL invariants , *CHERN-Simons gauge theory , *CRYSTAL field theory , *CONFORMAL field theory , *SPACETIME , *SYMMETRY - Abstract
The expectation value of a smooth conformal line defect in a CFT is a conformal invariant functional of its path in space-time. For example, in large N holographic theories, these fundamental observables are dual to the open-string partition function in AdS. In this paper, we develop a bootstrap method for studying them and apply it to conformal line defects in Chern-Simons matter theories. In these cases, the line bootstrap is based on three minimal assumptions — conformal invariance of the line defect, large N factorization, and the spectrum of the two lowest-lying operators at the end of the line. On the basis of these assumptions, we solve the one-dimensional CFT on the line and systematically compute the defect expectation value in an expansion around the straight line. We find that the conformal symmetry of a straight defect is insufficient to fix the answer. Instead, imposing the conformal symmetry of the defect along an arbitrary curved line leads to a functional bootstrap constraint. The solution to this constraint is found to be unique. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
- Published
- 2024
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