Arpan Bhattacharyya

On generalized gravitational entropy, squashed cones and holography

A bstractWe consider generalized gravitational entropy in various higher derivative theories of gravity dual to four dimensional CFTs using the recently proposed regularization of squashed cones. We derive the universal terms in the entanglement entropy for spherical and cylindrical surfaces. This is achieved by constructing the Fefferman-Graham expansion for the leading order metrics for the bulk geometry and evaluating the generalized gravitational entropy. We further show that the Wald entropy evaluated in the bulk geometry constructed for the regularized squashed cones leads to the correct universal parts of the entanglement entropy for both spherical and cylindrical entangling surfaces. We comment on the relation with the Iyer-Wald formula for dynamical horizons relating entropy to a Noether charge. Finally we show how to derive the entangling surface equation in Gauss-Bonnet holography.

Entanglement entropy in higher derivative holography

A bstractWe consider holographic entanglement entropy in higher derivative gravity theories. Recently Lewkowycz and Maldacena [1] have provided a method to derive the equations for the entangling surface from first principles. We use this method to compute the entangling surface in four derivative gravity. Certain interesting differences compared to the two derivative case are pointed out. For Gauss-Bonnet gravity, we show that in the regime where this method is applicable, the resulting equations coincide with proposals in the literature as well as with what follows from considerations of the stress tensor on the entangling surface. Finally we demonstrate that the area functional in Gauss-Bonnet holography arises as a counterterm needed to make the Euclidean action free of power law divergences.

On entanglement entropy functionals in higher-derivative gravity theories

A bstractIn arXiv:1310.5713 [1] and arXiv:1310.6659 [2] a formula was proposed as the entanglement entropy functional for a general higher-derivative theory of gravity, whose lagrangian consists of terms containing contractions of the Riemann tensor. In this paper, we carry out some tests of this proposal. First, we find the surface equation of motion for general four-derivative gravity theory by minimizing the holographic entanglement entropy functional resulting from this proposed formula. Then we calculate the surface equation for the same theory using the generalized gravitational entropy method of arXiv:1304.4926 [3]. We find that the two do not match in their entirety. We also construct the holographic entropy functional for quasi-topological gravity, which is a six-derivative gravity theory. We find that this functional gives the correct universal terms. However, as in the R2 case, the generalized gravitational entropy method applied to this theory does not give exactly the surface equation of motion coming from minimizing the entropy functional.

Constraining gravity using entanglement in AdS/CFT

A bstractWe investigate constraints imposed by entanglement on gravity in the context of holography. First, by demanding that relative entropy is positive and using the Ryu-Takayanagi entropy functional, we find certain constraints at a nonlinear level for the dual gravity. Second, by considering Gauss-Bonnet gravity, we show that for a class of small perturbations around the vacuum state, the positivity of the two point function of the field theory stress tensor guarantees the positivity of the relative entropy. Further, if we impose that the entangling surface closes off smoothly in the bulk interior, we find restrictions on the coupling constant in Gauss-Bonnet gravity. We also give an example of an anisotropic excited state in an unstable phase with broken conformal invariance which leads to a negative relative entropy.

c-theorems in arbitrary dimensions

The dilaton action in 3 + 1 dimensions plays a crucial role in the proof of the a-theorem. This action arises using Wess-Zumino consistency conditions and crucially relies on the existence of the trace anomaly. Since there are no anomalies in odd dimensions, it is interesting to ask how such an action could arise otherwise. Motivated by this we use the AdS/CFT correspondence to examine both even and odd dimensional conformal field theories. We find that in even dimensions, by promoting the cutoff to a field, one can get an action for this field which coincides with the Wess-Zumino action in flat space. In three dimensions, we observe that by finding an exact Hamilton-Jacobi counterterm, one can find a non-polynomial action which is invariant under global Weyl rescalings. We comment on how this finding is tied up with the F-theorem conjectures.

Viscosity bound for anisotropic superfluids in higher derivative gravity

A bstractIn the present paper, based on the principles of gauge/gravity duality we analytically compute the shear viscosity to entropy (η/s) ratio corresponding to the super fluid phase in Einstein Gauss-Bonnet gravity. From our analysis we note that the ratio indeed receives a finite temperature correction below certain critical temperature (T < Tc). This proves the non universality of η/s ratio in higher derivative theories of gravity. We also compute the upper bound for the Gauss-Bonnet coupling (λ) corresponding to the symmetry broken phase and note that the upper bound on the coupling does not seem to change as long as we are close to the critical point of the phase diagram. However the corresponding lower bound of the η/s ratio seems to get modified due to the finite temperature effects.

Exploring the Tensor Networks/AdS Correspondence

A bstractIn this paper we study the recently proposed tensor networks/AdS correspondence. We found that the Coxeter group is a useful tool to describe tensor networks in a negatively curved space. Studying generic tensor network populated by perfect tensors, we find that the physical wave function generically do not admit any connected correlation functions of local operators. To remedy the problem, we assume that wavefunctions admitting such semi-classical gravitational interpretation are composed of tensors close to, but not exactly perfect tensors. Computing corrections to the connected two point correlation functions, we find that the leading contribution is given by structures related to geodesics connecting the operators inserted at the boundary physical dofs. Such considerations admit generalizations at least to three point functions. This is highly suggestive of the emergence of the analogues of Witten diagrams in the tensor network. The perturbations alone however do not give the right entanglement spectrum. Using the Coxeter construction, we also constructed the tensor network counterpart of the BTZ black hole, by orbifolding the discrete lattice on which the network resides. We found that the construction naturally reproduces some of the salient features of the BTZ black hole, such as the appearance of RT surfaces that could wrap the horizon, depending on the size of the entanglement region A.

Entropy functionals and c-theorems from the second law

We show that for a general four derivative theory of gravity, only the holographic entanglement entropy functionals obey the second law at linearized order in perturbations. We also derive bounds on the higher curvature couplings in several examples, demanding the validity of the second law for higher order perturbations. For the five-dimensional Gauss-Bonnet theory in the context of AdS/CFT, the bound arising from black branes coincides with there being no sound channel instability close to the horizon. Repeating the analysis for topological black holes, the bound coincides with the tensor channel causality constraint (which is responsible for the viscosity bound). Furthermore, we show how to recover the holographic c-theorems in higher curvature theories from similar considerations based on the Raychaudhuri equation.

Entanglement entropy from the holographic stress tensor

We consider entanglement entropy in the context of gauge/gravity duality for conformal field theories in even dimensions. The holographic prescription due to Ryu and Takayanagi (RT) leads to an equation describing how the entangling surface extends into the bulk geometry. We show that setting to zero the time-time component of the Brown-York stress tensor evaluated on the co-dimension one entangling surface, leads to the same equation. By considering a spherical entangling surface as an example, we observe that Euclidean action methods in AdS/CFT will lead to the RT area functional arising as a counterterm needed to regularize the stress tensor. We present arguments leading to a justification for the minimal area prescription.

Renormalized entanglement entropy for BPS black branes

We compute the renormalized entanglement entropy (REE) for BPS black solutions in N = 2, four-dimensional gauged supergravity. We find that this quantity decreases monotonically with the size of the entangling region until it reaches a critical point, then increases and approaches the entropy density of the brane. This behavior can be understood as a consequence of the renormalized entanglement entropy being driven by two competing factors, namely, entanglement and the mixedness of the black brane. In the UV, entanglement dominates, whereas in the IR, the mixedness takes over.