Holographic models of de Sitter QFTs

TL;DR

This paper uses holographic duality to study the behavior of strongly coupled quantum field theories in de Sitter space, revealing phase transitions related to cosmological acceleration and temperature differences.

Contribution

It introduces holographic models for de Sitter QFTs, analyzing equilibrium states and phase transitions, including confinement/deconfinement, under cosmological conditions.

Findings

Equilibrium states with different temperatures are holographically consistent.

A confinement/deconfinement transition occurs at a critical cosmological acceleration.

The critical de Sitter temperature is lower than Minkowski space transition temperature by a factor of the spacetime dimension.

Abstract

We describe the dynamics of strongly coupled field theories in de Sitter spacetime using the holographic gauge/gravity duality. The main motivation for this is to explore the possibility of dynamical phase transitions during cosmological evolution. Specifically, we study two classes of theories: (i) conformal field theories on de Sitter in the static patch which are maintained in equilibrium at temperatures that may differ from the de Sitter temperature and (ii) confining gauge theories on de Sitter spacetime. In the former case we show the such states make sense from the holographic viewpoint in that they have regular bulk gravity solutions. In the latter situation we add to the evidence for a confinement/deconfinement transition for a large N planar gauge theory as the cosmological acceleration is increased past a critical value. For the field theories we study, the critical acceleration corresponds to a de Sitter temperature which is less than the Minkowski space deconfinement transition temperature by a factor of the spacetime dimension.