We propose a bootstrap program for CFTs near intersecting boundaries which form a co-dimension 2 edge. We describe the kinematical setup and show that bulk 1-pt functions and bulk-edge 2-pt functions depend on a non-trivial cross-ratio and on the angle between the boundaries. Using the boundary OPE (BOE) with respect to each boundary, we derive two independent conformal block expansions for these correlators. The matching of the two BOE expansions leads to a crossing equation. We analytically solve this equation in several simple cases, notably for a free bulk field, where we recover Feynman-diagrammatic results by Cardy.
The boundary correlation functions for a Quantum Field Theory (QFT) in an Anti-de Sitter (AdS) background can stay conformally covariant even if the bulk theory undergoes a renormalization group (RG) flow. Studying such correlation functions with the numerical conformal bootstrap leads to non-perturbative constraints that must hold along the entire flow. In this paper we carry out this analysis for the sine-Gordon RG flows in AdS2, which start with a free (compact) scalar in the UV and end with well-known massive integrable theories that saturate many S-matrix bootstrap bounds. We numerically analyze the correlation functions of both breathers and kinks and provide a detailed comparison with perturbation theory near the UV fixed point. Our bounds are often saturated to one or two orders in perturbation theory, as well as in the flat-space limit, but not necessarily in between.
Higher-point functions of scalar operators are a rich observable in CFTs, as they contain OPE data involving multiple spinning operators. We derive the lightcone blocks for five- and six-point functions in the snowflake channel and use them to bootstrap these correlators in the lightcone limit. As a result we determine the large spin expansion of OPE coefficients involving two or three spinning operators. We verify our results by comparing to the block decomposition of higher-point functions in generalized free theory and in theories with a cubic coupling.
We derive an optical theorem for perturbative CFTs which computes the double discontinuity of conformal correlators from the single discontinuities of lower order correlators, in analogy with the optical theorem for flat space scattering amplitudes. The theorem takes a purely multiplicative form in the CFT impact parameter representation used to describe high-energy scattering in the dual AdS theory. We use this result to study four-point correlation functions that are dominated in the Regge limit by the exchange of the graviton Regge trajectory (Pomeron) in the dual theory. At one-loop the scattering is dominated by double Pomeron exchange and receives contributions from tidal excitations of the scattering states which are efficiently described by an AdS vertex function, in close analogy with the known Regge limit result for one-loop string scattering in flat space at finite string tension. We compare the flat space limit of the conformal correlator to the flat space results and thus derive constraints on the one-loop vertex function for type IIB strings in AdS and also on general spinning tree level type IIB amplitudes in AdS.
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