Hot Spacetimes for Cold Atoms

TL;DR

This paper constructs string theory duals for non-relativistic critical phenomena at finite temperature and density, revealing black hole solutions with Schroedinger symmetry and analyzing their thermodynamics, including shear viscosity.

Contribution

It introduces new string theory duals for non-relativistic systems with finite temperature and density, expanding holographic models in this regime.

Findings

Black hole solutions with Schroedinger symmetry found in type IIB supergravity.

Dual non-relativistic field theories identified and analyzed.

Shear viscosity saturates the KSS bound at strong coupling.

Abstract

Building on our earlier work and that of Son, we construct string theory duals of non-relativistic critical phenomena at finite temperature and density. Concretely, we find black hole solutions of type IIB supergravity whose asymptotic geometries realize the Schroedinger group as isometries. We then identify the non-relativistic conformal field theories to which they are dual. We analyze the thermodynamics of these black holes, which turn out to describe the system at finite temperature and finite density. The strong-coupling result for the shear viscosity of the dual non-relativistic field theory saturates the KSS bound.