Renormalization Group Analysis of Tachyon Condensation

TL;DR

This paper uses renormalization group analysis of boundary conformal field theory to study tachyon condensation on D-branes, revealing the formation of extended brane lumps and their properties.

Contribution

It introduces a perturbative RG approach to analyze tachyon condensation, identifying fixed points corresponding to D-brane configurations and exploring multicritical behavior.

Findings

Boundary entropy decreases along RG flow, matching expected D-brane tension.

Lumps formed are extended objects with specific profiles.

End points suggest configurations of multiple D-branes.

Abstract

Renormalization group analysis of boundary conformal field theory on bosonic D25-brane is used to study tachyon condensation. Placing the lump on a finite circle and triggering only the first three tachyon modes, the theory flows to nearby IR fixed point representing lumps that are extended object with definite profile. The boundary entropy corresponding to the D24-brane tension is calculated in the leading order in perturbative analysis which decreases under RG flow and agrees with the expected result to an accuracy of 8%. Multicritical behaviour of the IR theory suggests that the end point of the flow represents a configuration of two D24-branes. Analogy with Kondo physics is discussed.