Sandipan Kundu - 1/2 Causality in Conformal Field Theory
Channel: Institut des Hautes Études Scientifiques (IHÉS)
Date: 24/02/2018

https://indico.math.cnrs.fr/event/3308/
Causality places nontrivial constraints on QFT in Lorentzian signature, for example fixing the signs of certain terms in the low energy Lagrangian. In these pedagogical lectures, I will explore causality constraints on conformal field theory. First, I will show how causality is encoded in crossing symmetry and reflection positivity of Euclidean correlators, and derive constraints on the interactions of low-lying operators directly from the conformal bootstrap. Then, I will explain the connection between these causality constraints and the averaged null energy condition. Finally, I will use causality to show that the averaged null energy is positive in interacting quantum field theory in flat spacetime. Based on arXiv:1509.00014, arXiv:1601.07904, arXiv:1610.05308.