In a previous series of papers it was proposed that black holes can be understood as Bose-Einstein condensates at the critical point of a quantum phase transition. Therefore other bosonic systems with quantum criticalities, such as the Lieb-Liniger model with attractive interactions, could possibly be used as toy models for black holes. Even such simple models are hard to analyse, as mean field theory usually breaks down at the critical point. Very few analytic results are known. In this paper we present a method of studying such systems at quantum critical points analytically. We will be able to find explicit expressions for the low energy spectrum of the Lieb-Liniger model and thereby to confirm the expected black hole like properties of such systems. This opens up an exciting possibility of constructing and studying black hole like systems in the laboratory.
In a previous series of papers it was proposed that black holes can be understood as Bose-Einstein condensates at the critical point of a quantum phase transition. Therefore other bosonic systems with quantum criticalities, such as the Lieb-Liniger model with attractive interactions, could possibly be used as toy models for black holes. Even such simple models are hard to analyse, as mean field theory usually breaks down at the critical point. Very few analytic results are known. In this paper we present a method of studying such systems at quantum critical points analytically. We will be able to find explicit expressions for the low energy spectrum of the Lieb-Liniger model and thereby to confirm the expected black hole like properties of such systems. This opens up an exciting possibility of constructing and studying black hole like systems in the laboratory.
It has recently been suggested that black holes may be described as condensates of weakly interacting gravitons at a critical point, exhibiting strong quantum effects. In this paper, we study a model system of attractive bosons in one spatial dimension which is known to undergo a quantum phase transition. We demonstrate explicitly that indeed quantum effects are important at the critical point, even if the number of particles is macroscopic. Most prominently, we evaluate the entropy of entanglement between different momentum modes and observe it to become maximal at the critical point. Furthermore, we explicitly see that the leading entanglement is between long-wavelength modes and is hence a feature independent of ultraviolet physics. If applicable to black holes, our findings substantiate the conjectured breakdown of semiclassical physics even for large black holes. This can resolve long-standing mysteries, such as the information paradox and the no-hair theorem.
Collective quantum effects have traditionally not received much attention in high energy physics. Recently, however, a model for black hole physics was put forward, in which black holes are described as Bose-condensates of gravitons close to a critical point. In a different line of research, estimates of high-energy collisions in the electro-weak theory have hinted that scattering processes with multiple Higgs or vector Bosons in the final state might be in reach for future particle colliders. In both scenarios, collective quantum effects may be crucial for understanding the physics. In the first part of this thesis, we address the black hole condensate picture of Dvali and Gomez. We study a Bosonic many-body system (attractive Lieb-Liniger) which exhibits a quantum phase transition and was proposed as a model for the graviton condensate. We demonstrate that, even for macroscopic particle number, quantum effects are prominent at the critical point. This becomes especially clear in the entanglement of different momentum modes and in the quantum discord between two successive density measurements. We point out that the leading contribution to these phenomena arises from long-wavelength modes and is therefore insensitive to ultra-violet physics. For black holes in the graviton condensate picture, these findings imply a breakdown of the semiclassical description and may be the key to resolving the long-standing information problem. We then turn our attention to the question of information processing in black holes. Inspired by the properties of three-dimensional attractive Bose condensates, we propose a concrete mechanism for fast scrambling in graviton-condensate black holes. To bolster our claims, we perform simulations of the Lieb-Liniger model in an appropriate regime that reveal entanglement-generation in logarithmic time. We also point out that the idea of instability and possibly chaos as the origin of fast quantum breaking and scrambling may also be relevant for other models of black holes. In the second part of this thesis, we use techniques of integrability (Bethe ansatz) to address the phase transition of the attractive Lieb-Liniger model analytically. We derive the continuum limit of the Bethe equations and solve it for the ground state at arbitrary coupling. We establish an exact equivalence between the Bethe-ansatz description in the large-particle-number limit and the large-N saddle point of Euclidean two dimensional U(N) Yang-Mills theory quantized on a sphere. The transition between the homogeneous and solitonic phases of the Lieb-Liniger model is thus dual to the Douglas-Kazakov confinement-deconfinement transition. In the last part, we consider scattering amplitudes involving many particles. In a simple integral-model, we study in detail the breakdown of perturbation theory and emphasize that the pure tree-level approximation fails earlier, parametrically. We then demonstrate, in three different (integral and quantum mechanical) model systems, that the physical high multiplicity amplitudes can be predicted on the basis of leading-order information from (non-perturbative) saddle points. In the non-Borel summable cases, one non-perturbative saddle contribution alone dominates the amplitudes. We highlight that high-multiplicity amplitudes may thus be a fruitful application for the methods of resurgence theory.
Recently a quantum portrait of black holes was suggested according to which a macroscopic black hole is a Bose--Einstein condensate of soft gravitons stuck at the critical point of a quantum phase transition. We explain why quantum criticality and instability are the key for an efficient generation of entanglement and consequently of the scrambling of information. By studying a simple Bose--Einstein prototype, we show that the scrambling time, which is set by the quantum break time of the system, goes as logN for N the number of quantum constituents or equivalently the black hole entropy.
Recent ideas about understanding physics of black hole information-processing in terms of quantum criticality allow us to implement black hole mechanisms of quantum computing within critical Bose-Einstein systems. The generic feature, uncovered both by analytic and numeric studies, is the emergence at the critical point of gapless weakly-interacting modes, which act as qubits for information-storage at a very low energy cost. These modes can be effectively described in terms of either Bogoliubov or Goldstone degrees of freedom. The ground-state at the critical point is maximally entangled and far from being classical. We confirm this near-critical behavior by a new analytic method. We compute growth of entanglement and show its consistency with black hole type behavior. On the other hand, in the over-critical regime the system develops a Lyapunov exponent and scrambles quantum information very fast. By, manipulating the system parameters externally, we can put it in and out of various regimes and in this way control the sequence of information storage and processing. By using gapless Bogoliubov modes as control qubits we design some simple logic gates.
We study the collapse of a self-gravitating Bose-Einstein condensate with attractive self-interaction. Equilibrium states in which the gravitational attraction and the attraction due to the self-interaction are counterbalanced by the quantum pressure (Heisenberg's uncertainty principle) exist only below a maximum mass ${M}_{\mathrm{max}}=1.012\ensuremath{\hbar}/\sqrt{Gm|{a}_{s}|}$ where as<0 is the scattering length of the bosons and m is their mass [P. H. Chavanis, Phys. Rev. D 84, 043531 (2011)]. For M>Mmax the system is expected to collapse and form a black hole. We study the collapse dynamics by making a Gaussian ansatz for the wave function and reducing the problem to the study of the motion of a particle in an effective potential. We find that the collapse time scales as $(M/{M}_{\mathrm{max}}\ensuremath{-}1{)}^{\ensuremath{-}1/4}$ for $M\ensuremath{\rightarrow}{M}_{\mathrm{max}}^{+}$ and as ${M}^{\ensuremath{-}1/2}$ for $M\ensuremath{\gg}{M}_{\mathrm{max}}$. Other analytical results are given above and below the critical point corresponding to a saddle-node bifurcation. We apply our results to QCD axions with mass $m={10}^{\ensuremath{-}4}\text{ }\text{ }\mathrm{eV}/{c}^{2}$ and scattering length ${a}_{s}=\ensuremath{-}5.8\ifmmode\times\else\texttimes\fi{}{10}^{\ensuremath{-}53}\text{ }\text{ }\mathrm{m}$ for which ${M}_{\mathrm{max}}=6.5\ifmmode\times\else\texttimes\fi{}{10}^{\ensuremath{-}14}{M}_{\ensuremath{\bigodot}}$ and $R=3.3\ifmmode\times\else\texttimes\fi{}{10}^{\ensuremath{-}4}{R}_{\ensuremath{\bigodot}}$. We confirm our previous claim that bosons with attractive self-interaction, such as QCD axions, may form low mass stars (axion stars or dark matter stars) but cannot form dark matter halos of relevant mass and size. These mini axion stars could be the constituents of dark matter. They can collapse into mini black holes of mass $\ensuremath{\sim}{10}^{\ensuremath{-}14}{M}_{\ensuremath{\bigodot}}$ in a few hours. In that case, dark matter halos would be made of mini black holes. We also apply our results to ultralight axions with mass $m=1.93\ifmmode\times\else\texttimes\fi{}{10}^{\ensuremath{-}20}\text{ }\text{ }\mathrm{eV}/{c}^{2}$ and scattering length ${a}_{s}=\ensuremath{-}8.29\ifmmode\times\else\texttimes\fi{}{10}^{\ensuremath{-}60}\text{ }\text{ }\mathrm{fm}$ for which ${M}_{\mathrm{max}}=0.39\ifmmode\times\else\texttimes\fi{}1{0}^{6}{M}_{\ensuremath{\bigodot}}$ and R=33pc. These ultralight axions could cluster into dark matter halos. Axionic dark matter halos with attractive self-interaction can collapse into supermassive black holes of mass $\ensuremath{\sim}1{0}^{6}{M}_{\ensuremath{\bigodot}}$ (similar to those reported at the center of galaxies) in about one million years. We point out the limitations of the Gaussian ansatz to describe the late stages of the collapse dynamics. We also mention the possibility that, instead of forming a black hole, the collapse may be accompanied by a burst or relativistic axions (bosenova) leading to a cycle of collapses and explosions as observed for nongravitational Bose-Einstein condensates with attractive self-interaction.
Many condensed matter experiments explore the finite temperature dynamics of systems near quantum critical points. Often, there are no well-defined quasiparticle excitations, and so quantum kinetic equations do not describe the transport properties completely. The theory shows that the transport coefficients are not proportional to a mean free scattering time (as is the case in the Boltzmann theory of quasiparticles), but are completely determined by the absolute temperature and by equilibrium thermodynamic observables. Recently, explicit solutions of this quantum critical dynamics have become possible via the anti-de Sitter/conformal field theory duality discovered in string theory. This shows that the quantum critical theory provides a holographic description of the quantum theory of black holes in a negatively curved anti-de Sitter space, and relates its transport coefficients to properties of the Hawking radiation from the black hole. We review how insights from this connection have led to new results for experimental systems: (i) the vicinity of the superfluid-insulator transition in the presence of an applied magnetic field, and its possible application to measurements of the Nernst effect in the cuprates, (ii) the magnetohydrodynamics of the plasma of Dirac electrons in graphene and the prediction of a hydrodynamic cyclotron resonance.