Amplitudes, Hopf algebras and the colour-kinematics duality

TL;DR

This paper investigates the algebraic structures underlying the colour-kinematics duality in scattering amplitudes, revealing deep connections with Hopf algebras and extending the algebraic framework to include all gluon orderings.

Contribution

It demonstrates the double-copy structure for gravitational HEFT amplitudes and extends the quasi-shuffle Hopf algebra to incorporate non-abelian gluon orderings.

Findings

Proved the double-copy form for gravitational HEFT amplitudes.

Linked coproducts of the kinematic algebra to factorisations of BCJ numerators.

Extended the algebra to include all gluon orderings with a reversing antipode.

Abstract

It was recently proposed that the kinematic algebra featuring in the colour-kinematics duality for scattering amplitudes in heavy-mass effective field theory (HEFT) and Yang-Mills theory is a quasi-shuffle Hopf algebra. The associated fusion product determines the structure of the Bern-Carrasco-Johansson (BCJ) numerators, which are manifestly gauge invariant and with poles corresponding to heavy-particle exchange. In this work we explore the deep connections between the quasi-shuffle algebra and general physical properties of the scattering amplitudes. First, after proving the double-copy form for gravitational HEFT amplitudes, we show that the coproducts of the kinematic algebra are in correspondence with factorisations of BCJ numerators on massive poles. We then study an extension of the standard quasi-shuffle Hopf algebra to a non-abelian version describing BCJ numerators with all possible gluon orderings. This is achieved by tensoring the original algebra with a particular Hopf algebra of orderings. In this extended version, a specific choice of the coproduct in the algebra of orderings leads to an antipode in the resulting Hopf algebra that has the interpretation of reversing the gluons' order within each BCJ numerator.