On the Shape Dependence of Entanglement Entropy

We study the shape dependence of entanglement entropy (EE) by deforming symmetric entangling surfaces. We show that entangling surfaces with a rotational or translational symmetry extremize (locally) the EE with respect to shape deformations that break some of the symmetry (i.e. the 1st order correction vanishes). This result applies to EE and Renyi entropy for any QFT in any dimension. Using Solodukhin's formula in $4d$ and holography in any $d$, we calculate the 2nd order correction to the universal EE for CFTs and simple symmetric entangling surfaces. In all cases we find that the 2nd order correction is positive, and thus the corresponding symmetric entangling surface is a local minimum. Some of the results are extended to free massive fields and to 4d Renyi entropy.Comment: 24 pages, 2 figures, minor changes, added reference

On Volumes of Subregions in Holography and Complexity

The volume of the region inside the bulk Ryu-Takayanagi surface is a codimension-one object, and a natural generalization of holographic complexity to the case of subregions in the boundary QFT. We focus on time-independent geometries, and study the properties of this volume in various circumstances. We derive a formula for computing the volume for a strip entangling surface and a general asymptotically AdS bulk geometry. For an AdS black hole geometry, the volume exhibits non-monotonic behaviour as a function of the size of the entangling region (unlike the behaviour of the entanglement entropy in this setup, which is monotonic). For setups in which the holographic entanglement entropy exhibits transitions in the bulk, such as global AdS black hole, geometries dual to confining theories and disjoint entangling surfaces, the corresponding volume exhibits a discontinuous finite jump at the transition point (and so do the volumes of the corresponding entanglement wedges). We compute this volume discontinuity in several examples. Lastly, we compute the codim-zero volume and the bulk action of the entanglement wedge for the case of a sphere entangling surface and pure AdS geometry.Comment: 25 page

Holographic Entanglement Entropy of Multiple Strips

We study holographic entanglement entropy (HEE) of $m$ strips in various holographic theories. We prove that for $m$ strips with equal lengths and equal separations, there are only 2 bulk minimal surfaces. For backgrounds which contain also "disconnected" surfaces, there are only 4 bulk minimal surfaces. Depending on the length of the strips and separation between them, the HEE exhibits first order "geometric" phase transitions between bulk minimal surfaces with different topologies. We study these different phases and display various phase diagrams. For confining geometries with $m$ strips, we find new classes of "disconnected" bulk minimal surfaces, and the resulting phase diagrams have a rich structure. We also study the "entanglement plateau" transition, where we consider the BTZ black hole in global coordinates with 2 strips. It is found that there are 4 bulk minimal surfaces, and the resulting phase diagram is displayed. We perform a general perturbative analysis of the $m$-strip system: including perturbing the CFT and perturbing the length or separation of the strips.Comment: 32 pages; v2: citations adde

Renormalization group flow of entanglement entropy on spheres

We explore entanglement entropy of a cap-like region for a generic quantum field theory residing in the Bunch-Davies vacuum on de Sitter space. Entanglement entropy in our setup is identical with the thermal entropy in the static patch of de Sitter, and we derive a simple relation between the vacuum expectation value of the energy-momentum tensor trace and the RG flow of entanglement entropy. In particular, renormalization of the cosmological constant and logarithmic divergence of the entanglement entropy are interrelated in our setup. We confirm our findings by recovering known universal contributions for a free field theory deformed by a mass operator as well as obtain correct universal behaviour at the fixed points. Simple examples of entanglement entropy flows are elaborated in $d=2,3,4$. In three dimensions we find that while the renormalized entanglement entropy is stationary at the fixed points, it is not monotonic. We provide a computational evidence that the universal `area law' for a conformally coupled scalar is different from the known result in the literature, and argue that this difference survives in the limit of flat space. Finally, we carry out the spectral decomposition of entanglement entropy flow and discuss its application to the F-theorem.Comment: 38 pages, 2 figures; v2: references added, version accepted to JHE

On the Time Dependence of Holographic Complexity

We evaluate the full time dependence of holographic complexity in various eternal black hole backgrounds using both the complexity=action (CA) and the complexity=volume (CV) conjectures. We conclude using the CV conjecture that the rate of change of complexity is a monotonically increasing function of time, which saturates from below to a positive constant in the late time limit. Using the CA conjecture for uncharged black holes, the holographic complexity remains constant for an initial period, then briefly decreases but quickly begins to increase. As observed previously, at late times, the rate of growth of the complexity approaches a constant, which may be associated with Lloyd's bound on the rate of computation. However, we find that this late time limit is approached from above, thus violating the bound. Adding a charge to the eternal black holes washes out the early time behaviour, i.e., complexity immediately begins increasing with sufficient charge, but the late time behaviour is essentially the same as in the neutral case. We also evaluate the complexity of formation for charged black holes and find that it is divergent for extremal black holes, implying that the states at finite chemical potential and zero temperature are infinitely more complex than their finite temperature counterparts.Comment: 52+31 pages, 30 figure

On the Time Dependence of Holographic Complexity

We evaluate the full time dependence of holographic complexity in various eternal black hole backgrounds using both the complexity=action (CA) and the complexity=volume (CV) conjectures. We conclude using the CV conjecture that the rate of change of complexity is a monotonically increasing function of time, which saturates from below to a positive constant in the late time limit. Using the CA conjecture for uncharged black holes, the holographic complexity remains constant for an initial period, then briefly decreases but quickly begins to increase. As observed previously, at late times, the rate of growth of the complexity approaches a constant, which may be associated with Lloyd's bound on the rate of computation. However, we find that this late time limit is approached from above, thus violating the bound. Adding a charge to the eternal black holes washes out the early time behaviour, i.e., complexity immediately begins increasing with sufficient charge, but the late time behaviour is essentially the same as in the neutral case. We also evaluate the complexity of formation for charged black holes and find that it is divergent for extremal black holes, implying that the states at finite chemical potential and zero temperature are infinitely more complex than their finite temperature counterparts.Comment: 52+31 pages, 30 figure

Loops in AdS: From the Spectral Representation to Position Space

We compute a family of scalar loop diagrams in $AdS$. We use the spectral representation to derive various bulk vertex/propagator identities, and these identities enable to reduce certain loop bubble diagrams to lower loop diagrams, and often to tree-level exchange or contact diagrams. An important example is the computation of the finite coupling 4-point function of the large-$N$ conformal $O(N)$ model on $AdS_3$. Remarkably, the re-summation of bubble diagrams is equal to a tree-level contact diagram: the $\bar{D}_{1,1,\frac{3}{2},\frac{3}{2}} (z,\bar z)$ function. Another example is a scalar with $\phi^4$ or $\phi^3$ coupling in $AdS_3$: we compute various 4-point (and higher point) loop bubble diagrams with alternating integer and half-integer scaling dimensions in terms of a finite sum of contact diagrams and tree-level exchange diagrams. The 4-point function with external scaling dimensions differences obeying $\Delta_{12}=0$ and $\Delta_{34}=1$ enjoys significant simplicity which enables us to compute in quite generality. For integer or half-integer scaling dimensions, we show that the $M$-loop bubble diagram can be written in terms of Lerch transcendent functions of the cross-ratios $z$ and $\bar z$. Finally, we compute 2-point bulk bubble diagrams with endpoints in the bulk, and the result can be written in terms of Lerch transcendent functions of the AdS chordal distance. We show that the similarity of the latter two computations is not a coincidence, but arises from a vertex identity between the bulk 2-point function and the double-discontinuity of the boundary 4-point function.Comment: Corrections made, 52 pages, 20 figure