Interface conformal anomalies

Christopher P. Herzog; Kuo Wei Huang; Dmitri V. Vassilevich

doi:10.1007/JHEP10(2020)132

Interface conformal anomalies

Christopher P. Herzog, Kuo Wei Huang^*, Dmitri V. Vassilevich

^*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

7 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

We consider two d ≥ 2 conformal field theories (CFTs) glued together along a codimension one conformal interface. The conformal anomaly of such a system contains both bulk and interface contributions. In a curved-space setup, we compute the heat kernel coefficients and interface central charges in free theories. The results are consistent with the known boundary CFT data via the folding trick. In d = 4, two interface invariants generally allowed as anomalies turn out to have vanishing interface charges. These missing invariants are constructed from components with odd parity with respect to flipping the orientation of the defect. We conjecture that all invariants constructed from components with odd parity may have vanishing coefficient for symmetric interfaces, even in the case of interacting interface CFT.

Original language	English
Article number	132
Journal	Journal of High Energy Physics
Volume	2020
Issue number	10
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1007/JHEP10(2020)132
Publication status	Published - 1 Oct 2020

Keywords

Boundary Quantum Field Theory
Conformal Field Theory
Field Theories in Higher Dimensions

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10.1007/JHEP10(2020)132

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title = "Interface conformal anomalies",

abstract = "We consider two d ≥ 2 conformal field theories (CFTs) glued together along a codimension one conformal interface. The conformal anomaly of such a system contains both bulk and interface contributions. In a curved-space setup, we compute the heat kernel coefficients and interface central charges in free theories. The results are consistent with the known boundary CFT data via the folding trick. In d = 4, two interface invariants generally allowed as anomalies turn out to have vanishing interface charges. These missing invariants are constructed from components with odd parity with respect to flipping the orientation of the defect. We conjecture that all invariants constructed from components with odd parity may have vanishing coefficient for symmetric interfaces, even in the case of interacting interface CFT.",

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AU - Vassilevich, Dmitri V.

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N2 - We consider two d ≥ 2 conformal field theories (CFTs) glued together along a codimension one conformal interface. The conformal anomaly of such a system contains both bulk and interface contributions. In a curved-space setup, we compute the heat kernel coefficients and interface central charges in free theories. The results are consistent with the known boundary CFT data via the folding trick. In d = 4, two interface invariants generally allowed as anomalies turn out to have vanishing interface charges. These missing invariants are constructed from components with odd parity with respect to flipping the orientation of the defect. We conjecture that all invariants constructed from components with odd parity may have vanishing coefficient for symmetric interfaces, even in the case of interacting interface CFT.

AB - We consider two d ≥ 2 conformal field theories (CFTs) glued together along a codimension one conformal interface. The conformal anomaly of such a system contains both bulk and interface contributions. In a curved-space setup, we compute the heat kernel coefficients and interface central charges in free theories. The results are consistent with the known boundary CFT data via the folding trick. In d = 4, two interface invariants generally allowed as anomalies turn out to have vanishing interface charges. These missing invariants are constructed from components with odd parity with respect to flipping the orientation of the defect. We conjecture that all invariants constructed from components with odd parity may have vanishing coefficient for symmetric interfaces, even in the case of interacting interface CFT.

KW - Boundary Quantum Field Theory

KW - Conformal Field Theory

KW - Field Theories in Higher Dimensions

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SN - 1126-6708

VL - 2020

JO - Journal of High Energy Physics

JF - Journal of High Energy Physics

IS - 10

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ER -

Interface conformal anomalies

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