We show that holographic models of QCD predict the presence of a Chern-Simons coupling between vector and axial-vector mesons at finite baryon density. In the AdS/CFT dictionary, the coefficient of this coupling is proportional to the baryon number density, and is fixed uniquely in the five-dimensional holographic dual by anomalies in the flavor currents. For the lightest mesons, the coupling mixes transverse ρ and a1 polarization states. At sufficiently large baryon number densities, it produces an instability, which causes the ρ and a1 mesons to condense in a state breaking both rotational and translational invariance.

We consider the differential and total cross sections for proton-proton and proton-antiproton scattering in the Regge regime from the point of view of string dual models of QCD. We argue that the form factor which appears in the differential cross section is related to the matrix element of the stress tensor between proton states and give a procedure for computing the strength of the coupling of the Pomeron trajectory to the proton. We compute this coupling in the Sakai-Sugimoto model and find excellent agreement with the data at large s and small t. The form factor can be estimated in the Skyrme model or in AdS/QCD models and gives a stiffer form factor than the commonly used electromagnetic form factor, in agreement with our fits to data. Our model is also in good agreement with the measured ratio of real to imaginary parts of the forward scattering amplitude at large s.

We employ both top-down and bottom-up holographic dual models of QCD to calculate vertex functions and couplings that are induced by the five dimensional Chern-Simons term. We use these couplings to study the photoproduction of f1 mesons. The Chern-Simons-term-induced interaction leads to a simple relation between the polarization of the incoming photon and the final state f1 meson which should allow a clear separation of this interaction from competing processes.