Surface Operators and Exact Holography

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates that correlation functions involving surface operators in ${ m N}=4$ super Yang-Mills are exactly captured by supergravity in the AdS/CFT correspondence, revealing new insights into quantum corrections and S-duality.

Contribution

It proves the exact polynomial nature of certain correlation functions and computes surface operator VEVs and correlators using supersymmetric localization, connecting them to holography.

Findings

Correlation functions are finite polynomials in the coupling constant.

Surface operator VEVs and correlators match supergravity predictions.

The results realize the conjectured action of S-duality in ${ m N}=4$ SYM.

Abstract

Surface operators are nonlocal probes of gauge theories capable of distinguishing phases that are not discernible by the classic Wilson-'t Hooft criterion. We prove that the correlation function of a surface operator with a chiral primary operator in ${\cal N}=4$ super Yang-Mills is a finite polynomial in the Yang-Mills coupling constant. Surprisingly, in spite of these observables receiving nontrivial quantum corrections, we find that these correlation functions are exactly captured in the 't Hooft limit by supergravity in asymptotically $AdS_5\times S^5$ [1]! We also calculate exactly the surface operator vacuum expectation value and the correlator of a surface operator with 1/8-BPS Wilson loops using supersymmetric localization. We demonstrate that these correlation functions in ${\cal N}=4$ SYM realize in a nontrivial fashion the conjectured action of $S$-duality. Finally, we perturbatively quantize ${\cal N}=4$ SYM around the surface operator singularity and identify the Feynman diagrams that when summed over reproduce the exact result obtained by localization.