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ERC Consolidator Grant NP-QFT "Non-perturbative dynamics of quantum fields: From new deconfined
phases of matter to quantum black holes" (2020/ 2025)
When the degrees of freedom that constitute a quantum physical system
are strongly coupled among each other, their collective low-energy
behaviour can exhibit a plethora of exotic, surprising and
unconventional phenomena. At the same time, however, our most
sophisticated tool to describe the quantum world - quantum field
theory - becomes extremely difficult to use. This problem appears
across the board in many areas, from particle physics, to condensed
matter physics, to astrophysics: strong coupling is an intrinsic
complexity of quantum systems, whose solution can benefit disparate
fields. A large variety of examples is provided by deconfined quantum
states of matter, in which the collective behaviour gives rise to
emergent low-energy degrees of freedom, often strongly coupled.
Another context in which decrypting strong coupling can be the key to
a breakthrough is quantum gravity: by the celebrated AdS/CFT
correspondence, we can describe gravity in Anti-de-Sitter space in a
fully-consistent quantum fashion, in terms of an ordinary - but
strongly coupled - quantum field theory in one dimension less.
The ambitious goal of this project is twofold: first, to develop
innovative techniques to tame strong coupling; second, to exploit
those techniques to discover new deconfined phases of matter on one
side, and to unravel mysteries of quantum gravity and the quantum
physics of black holes on the other side. We will follow several
avenues in the quest for new computational tools at strong coupling,
such as refining the concept of symmetry, developing supersymmetric
localization, probing Borel summability of certain gauge theories.
Applying these and other methods, we will systematically explore
three-dimensional gauge theories with bosons and fermions, landscaping
their phase diagrams and deconfined critical points. Meanwhile, we
will extract the quantum entropy and other properties of black holes,
exploring signatures of quantum effects to be compared with future
experiments.
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