Towards the solution to the giant graviton puzzle

TL;DR

This paper explores potential solutions to the giant graviton puzzle by analyzing the dual descriptions of giant gravitons and their boundary states, highlighting differences in their physical interpretations and regimes of validity.

Contribution

It proposes that sphere and AdS giant gravitons have distinct boundary descriptions and introduces the idea that a boundary state can represent multiple giant graviton configurations.

Findings

Sphere and AdS giant gravitons have different boundary descriptions.

Unpolarized KK gravitons are unphysical where giant gravitons exist.

A boundary state can correspond to various giant graviton configurations.

Abstract

In this note we present several ideas toward the solution to the giant graviton puzzle - the apparent multiplicity of supergravity states dual to field theory chiral primary operators. We use the fact that, for certain ranges of the angular momentum, giant gravitons can be mapped into vacua of a dual theory to argue that the sphere and $AdS$ giant gravitons have very different boundary descriptions, and that an unpolarized KK graviton is unphysical in the regime where giant gravitons exist. We also show that a generic boundary state can correspond to different giant graviton configurations, which have non-overlapping ranges of validity.