Entanglement Structure of Deconfined Quantum Critical Points

We study the entanglement properties of deconfined quantum critical points. We show not only that these critical points may be distinguished by their entanglement structure but also that they are in general more highly entangled that conventional critical points. We primarily focus on computations of the entanglement entropy of deconfined critical points in 2+1 dimensions, drawing connections to topological entanglement entropy and a recent conjecture on the monotonicity under RG flow of universal terms in the entanglement entropy. We also consider in some detail a variety of issues surrounding the extraction of universal terms in the entanglement entropy. Finally, we compare some of our results to recent numerical simulations.Comment: 12 pages, 4 figure

Entanglement, Replicas, and Thetas

We compute the single-interval Renyi entropy (replica partition function) for free fermions in 1+1d at finite temperature and finite spatial size by two methods: (i) using the higher-genus partition function on the replica Riemann surface, and (ii) using twist operators on the torus. We compare the two answers for a restricted set of spin structures, leading to a non-trivial proposed equivalence between higher-genus Siegel $\Theta$-functions and Jacobi $\theta$-functions. We exhibit this proposal and provide substantial evidence for it. The resulting expressions can be elegantly written in terms of Jacobi forms. Thereafter we argue that the correct Renyi entropy for modular-invariant free-fermion theories, such as the Ising model and the Dirac CFT, is given by the higher-genus computation summed over all spin structures. The result satisfies the physical checks of modular covariance, the thermal entropy relation, and Bose-Fermi equivalence.Comment: 34 page

Entropy and quantum gravity

We give a review, in the style of an essay, of the author's 1998 matter-gravity entanglement hypothesis which, unlike the standard approach to entropy based on coarse-graining, offers a definition for the entropy of a closed system as a real and objective quantity. We explain how this approach offers an explanation for the Second Law of Thermodynamics in general and a non-paradoxical understanding of information loss during black hole formation and evaporation in particular. It also involves a radically different from usual description of black hole equilibrium states in which the total state of a black hole in a box together with its atmosphere is a pure state -- entangled in just such a way that the reduced state of the black hole and of its atmosphere are each separately approximately thermal. We also briefly recall some recent work of the author which involves a reworking of the string-theory understanding of black hole entropy consistent with this alternative description of black hole equilibrium states and point out that this is free from some unsatisfactory features of the usual string theory understanding. We also recall the author's recent arguments based on this alternative description which suggest that the AdS/CFT correspondence is a bijection between the boundary CFT and just the matter degrees of freedom of the bulk theory.Comment: 15 pages. Considerably enlarged. 3 figures and many references added. Also published in the recent special issue "Entropy in Quantum Gravity and Quantum Cosmology" (ed. Remo Garattini) of the online journal "Entropy". (Note: that journal version will soon be replaced with an updated version where some typesetting errors are corrected. This arXiv version is also free from those errors.

Brick Walls and AdS/CFT

We discuss the relationship between the bulk-boundary correspondence in Rehren's algebraic holography (and in other 'fixed-background' approaches to holography) and in mainstream 'Maldacena AdS/CFT'. Especially, we contrast the understanding of black-hole entropy from the viewpoint of QFT in curved spacetime -- in the framework of 't Hooft's 'brick wall' model -- with the understanding based on Maldacena AdS/CFT. We show that the brick-wall modification of a Klein Gordon field in the Hartle-Hawking-Israel state on 1+2-Schwarzschild AdS (BTZ) has a well-defined boundary limit with the same temperature and entropy as the brick-wall-modified bulk theory. One of our main purposes is to point out a close connection, for general AdS/CFT situations, between the puzzle raised by Arnsdorf and Smolin regarding the relationship between Rehren's algebraic holography and mainstream AdS/CFT and the puzzle embodied in the 'correspondence principle' proposed by Mukohyama and Israel in their work on the brick-wall approach to black hole entropy. Working on the assumption that similar results will hold for bulk QFT other than the Klein Gordon field and for Schwarzschild AdS in other dimensions, and recalling the first author's proposed resolution to the Mukohyama-Israel puzzle based on his 'matter-gravity entanglement hypothesis', we argue that, in Maldacena AdS/CFT, the algebra of the boundary CFT is isomorphic only to a proper subalgebra of the bulk algebra, albeit (at non-zero temperature) the (GNS) Hilbert spaces of bulk and boundary theories are still the 'same' -- the total bulk state being pure, while the boundary state is mixed (thermal). We also argue from the finiteness of its boundary (and hence, on our assumptions, also bulk) entropy at finite temperature, that the Rehren dual of the Maldacena boundary CFT cannot itself be a QFT and must, instead, presumably be something like a string theory.Comment: 54 pages, 3 figures. Arguments strengthened in the light of B.S. Kay `Instability of Enclosed Horizons' arXiv:1310.739

Black Hole Macro-Quantumness

It is a common wisdom that properties of macroscopic bodies are well described by (semi)classical physics. As we have suggested this wisdom is not applicable to black holes. Despite being macroscopic, black holes are quantum objects. They represent Bose-Einstein condensates of N-soft gravitons at the quantum critical point, where N Bogoliubov modes become gapless. As a result, physics governing arbitrarily-large black holes (e.g., of galactic size) is a quantum physics of the collective Bogoiliubov modes. This fact introduces a new intrinsically-quantum corrections in form of 1/N, as opposed to exp(-N). These corrections are unaccounted by the usual semiclassical expansion in h and cannot be recast in form of a quantum back-reaction to classical metric. Instead the metric itself becomes an approximate entity. These 1/N corrections abolish the presumed properties of black holes, such as non existence of hair, and are the key to nullifying the so-called information paradox.Comment: 14 page

Parts of Quantum States

It is shown that generic N-party pure quantum states (with equidimensional subsystems) are uniquely determined by their reduced states of just over half the parties; in other words, all the information in almost all N-party pure states is in the set of reduced states of just over half the parties. For N even, the reduced states in fewer than N/2 parties are shown to be an insufficient description of almost all states (similar results hold when N is odd). It is noted that Real Algebraic Geometry is a natural framework for any analysis of parts of quantum states: two simple polynomials, a quadratic and a cubic, contain all of their structure. Algorithmic techniques are described which can provide conditions for sets of reduced states to belong to pure or mixed states.Comment: 10 pages, 1 figur