Holographic Renormalization Group Structure in Higher-Derivative Gravity

Classical higher-derivative gravity is investigated in the context of the holographic renormalization group (RG). We parametrize the Euclidean time such that one step of time evolution in (d+1)-dimensional bulk gravity can be directly interpreted as that of block spin transformation of the d-dimensional boundary field theory. This parametrization simplifies the analysis of the holographic RG structure in gravity systems, and conformal fixed points are always described by AdS geometry. We find that higher-derivative gravity generically induces extra degrees of freedom which acquire huge mass around stable fixed points and thus are coupled to highly irrelevant operators at the boundary. In the particular case of pure R^2-gravity, we show that some region of the coefficients of curvature-squared terms allows us to have two fixed points (one is multicritical) which are connected by a kink solution. We further extend our analysis to Minkowski time to investigate a model of expanding universe described by the action with curvature-squared terms and positive cosmological constant, and show that, in any dimensionality but four, one can have a classical solution which describes time evolution from a de Sitter geometry to another de Sitter geometry, along which the Hubble parameter changes drastically.Comment: 26 pages, 6 figures, typos correcte

Gradient flow and the renormalization group

We investigate the renormalization group (RG) structure of the gradient flow. Instead of using the original bare action to generate the flow, we propose to use the effective action at each flow time. We write down the basic equation for scalar field theory that determines the evolution of the action, and argue that the equation can be regarded as a RG equation if one makes a field-variable transformation at every step such that the kinetic term is kept to take the canonical form. We consider a local potential approximation (LPA) to our equation, and show that the result has a natural interpretation with Feynman diagrams. We make an $\varepsilon$ expansion of the LPA and show that it reproduces the eigenvalues of the linearized RG transformation around both the Gaussian and the Wilson-Fisher fixed points to the order of $\varepsilon$.Comment: 11 pages, 1 figure; v2, v3: typos corrected, some discussions improve

Comments on D-Instantons in c<1 Strings

We suggest that the boundary cosmological constant \zeta in c<1 unitary string theory be regarded as the one-dimensional complex coordinate of the target space on which the boundaries of world-sheets can live. From this viewpoint we explicitly construct analogues of D-instantons which satisfy Polchinski's ``combinatorics of boundaries.'' We further show that our operator formalism developed in the preceding articles is powerful in evaluating D-instanton effects, and also demonstrate for simple cases that these effects exactly coincide with the stringy nonperturbative effects found in the exact solutions of string equations.Comment: 12 pages with 1 figure, LaTex, Version to appear in PL

A Note on the Weyl Anomaly in the Holographic Renormalization Group

We give a prescription for calculating the holographic Weyl anomaly in arbitrary dimension within the framework based on the Hamilton-Jacobi equation proposed by de Boer, Verlinde and Verlinde. A few sample calculations are made and shown to reproduce the results that are obtained to this time with a different method. We further discuss continuum limits, and argue that the holographic renormalization group may describe the renormalized trajectory in the parameter space. We also clarify the relationship of the present formalism to the analysis carried out by Henningson and Skenderis.Comment: LaTeX, 24 pages, 2 figures, typos correcte

Master equation for the Unruh-DeWitt detector and the universal relaxation time in de Sitter space

We derive the master equation that completely determines the time evolution of the density matrix of the Unruh-DeWitt detector in an arbitrary background geometry. We apply the equation to reveal a nonequilibrium thermodynamic character of de Sitter space. This generalizes an earlier study on the thermodynamic property of the Bunch-Davies vacuum that an Unruh-DeWitt detector staying in the Poincare patch and interacting with a scalar field in the Bunch-Davies vacuum behaves as if it is in a thermal bath of finite temperature. In this paper, instead of the Bunch-Davies vacuum, we consider a class of initial states of scalar field, for which the detector behaves as if it is in a medium that is not in thermodynamic equilibrium and that undergoes a relaxation to the equilibrium corresponding to the Bunch-Davies vacuum. We give a prescription for calculating the relaxation times of the nonequilibrium processes. We particularly show that, when the initial state of the scalar field is the instantaneous ground state at a finite past, the relaxation time is always given by a universal value of half the curvature radius of de Sitter space. We expect that the relaxation time gives a nonequilibrium thermodynamic quantity intrinsic to de Sitter space.Comment: 41 pages, 10 figures; v2: typos corrected; v3: typos corrected; v4: clarifications and references added; v5: final version appearing in PR

Noncommutative inflation and the large-scale damping in the CMB anisotropy

We show that a certain class of short-distance cutoff can give rise to large suppression on the CMB anisotropies at large angular scales.Comment: 7 pages, 2 figures. Fonts changed. Talk given at QTS3 (Cincinnati, OH, Sept. 2003

Holographic Renormalization Group

The holographic renormalization group (RG) is reviewed in a self-contained manner. The holographic RG is based on the idea that the radial coordinate of a space-time with asymptotically AdS geometry can be identified with the RG flow parameter of the boundary field theory. After briefly discussing basic aspects of the AdS/CFT correspondence, we explain how the notion of the holographic RG comes out in the AdS/CFT correspondence. We formulate the holographic RG based on the Hamilton-Jacobi equations for bulk systems of gravity and scalar fields, as was introduced by de Boer, Verlinde and Verlinde. We then show that the equations can be solved with a derivative expansion by carefully extracting local counterterms from the generating functional of the boundary field theory. The calculational methods to obtain the Weyl anomaly and scaling dimensions are presented and applied to the RG flow from the N=4 SYM to an N=1 superconformal fixed point discovered by Leigh and Strassler. We further discuss a relation between the holographic RG and the noncritical string theory, and show that the structure of the holographic RG should persist beyond the supergravity approximation as a consequence of the renormalizability of the nonlinear sigma model action of noncritical strings. As a check, we investigate the holographic RG structure of higher-derivative gravity systems, and show that such systems can also be analyzed based on the Hamilton-Jacobi equations, and that the behaviour of bulk fields are determined solely by their boundary values. We also point out that higher-derivative gravity systems give rise to new multicritical points in the parameter space of the boundary field theories.Comment: 95 pages, 6 figures. Typos are corrected. References and a discussion about continuum limit are adde

Comments on T-dualities of Ramond-Ramond Potentials

The type IIA/IIB effective actions compactified on T^d are known to be invariant under the T-duality group SO(d, d; Z) although the invariance of the R-R sector is not so direct to see. Inspired by a work of Brace, Morariu and Zumino,we introduce new potentials which are mixture of R-R potentials and the NS-NS 2-form in order to make the invariant structure of R-R sector more transparent. We give a simple proof that if these new potentials transform as a Majorana-Weyl spinor of SO(d, d; Z), the effective actions are indeed invariant under the T-duality group. The argument is made in such a way that it can apply to Kaluza-Klein forms of arbitrary degree. We also demonstrate that these new fields simplify all the expressions including the Chern-Simons term.Comment: 26 pages; LaTeX; major version up; discussion on the Chern-Simons term added; references adde

Matter fields in triangle-hinge models

The worldvolume theory of membrane is mathematically equivalent to three-dimensional quantum gravity coupled to matter fields corresponding to the target space coordinates of embedded membrane. In a recent paper [arXiv:1503.08812] a new class of models are introduced that generate three-dimensional random volumes, where the Boltzmann weight of each configuration is given by the product of values assigned to the triangles and the hinges. These triangle-hinge models describe three-dimensional pure gravity and are characterized by semisimple associative algebras. In this paper, we introduce matter degrees of freedom to the models by coloring simplices in a way that they have local interactions. This is achieved simply by extending the associative algebras of the original triangle-hinge models, and the profile of matter field is specified by the set of colors and the form of interactions. The dynamics of a membrane in $D$-dimensional spacetime can then be described by taking the set of colors to be $\mathbb{R}^D$. By taking another set of colors, we can also realize three-dimensional quantum gravity coupled to the Ising model, the $q$-state Potts models or the RSOS models. One can actually assign colors to simplices of any dimensions (tetrahedra, triangles, edges and vertices), and three-dimensional colored tensor models can be realized as triangle-hinge models by coloring tetrahedra, triangles and edges at a time.Comment: 21 pages, 14 figures. v2: discussions in section 4 improved. v3: title changed, introduction enlarge