Challenges
Datasets
Workspaces
Papers
Discussions
Leaderboard
Log inSign up
Challenges
Datasets
Workspaces
Papers
Discussions
Leaderboard
Blog
Job Board
Q3AS

© 2026 Aqora Quantum S.A.S.

TermsPrivacyLegal Notice

arXiv:1601.06794 · Journal of High Energy Physics

Higher-point conformal blocks and entanglement entropy in heavy states

Pinaki Banerjee, Shouvik Datta, Ritam Sinha

Published May 1, 2016• 74 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

We consider conformal blocks of two heavy operators and an arbitrary number of light operators in a (1+1)-d CFT with large central charge. Using the monodromy method, these higher-point conformal blocks are shown to factorize into products of 4-point conformal blocks in the heavy-light limit for a class of OPE channels. This result is reproduced by considering suitable worldline configurations in the bulk conical defect geometry. We apply the CFT results to calculate the entanglement entropy of an arbitrary number of disjoint intervals for heavy states. The corresponding holographic entanglement entropy calculated via the minimal area prescription precisely matches these results from CFT. Along the way, we briefly illustrate the relation of these conformal blocks to Riemann surfaces and their associated moduli space.

DOI
10.1007/jhep05(2016)127

Related papers

Holographic entanglement entropy from 2d CFT: heavy states and local quenches

Curtis T. Asplund, Alice Bernamonti, Federico Galli +1 more

We consider the entanglement entropy in 2d conformal field theory in a class of excited states produced by the insertion of a heavy local operator. These include both high-energy eigenstates of the Hamiltonian and time-dependent local quenches. We compute the universal contribution from the stress tensor to the single interval Renyi entropies and entanglement entropy, and conjecture that this dominates the answer in theories with a large central charge and a sparse spectrum of low-dimension operators. The resulting entanglement entropies agree precisely with holographic calculations in three-dimensional gravity. High-energy eigenstates are dual to microstates of the BTZ black hole, so the corresponding holographic calculation is a geodesic length in the black hole geometry; agreement between these two answers demonstrates that these individual microstates of holographic CFTs effectively thermalize at the level of the single-interval entanglement entropy. For local quenches, the dual geometry is a highly boosted black hole or conical defect. On the CFT side, the rise in entanglement entropy after a quench is directly related to the monodromy of a Virasoro conformal block.

arXiv:1410.1392•Journal of High Energy Physics•Feb 1, 2015•279 citations

Holographic entanglement entropy for a large class of states in 2D CFT

Bin Chen, Jie-qiang Wu

In this paper, we study the entanglement entropy in a large class of states of two-dimensional conformal field theory in the the large central charge limit. This class of states includes the states created by the insertion of a finite number of local heavy operators. By using the monodromy analysis, we obtain the leading order entanglement entropy for the general state. We show that it is exactly captured by the Ryu-Takayanagi formula, by using the Wilsonian line prescription in the Chern-Simons formulation of the AdS3 gravity.

arXiv:1605.06753•Journal of High Energy Physics•Sep 1, 2016•22 citations

Entanglement Entropy at Large Central Charge

Thomas Hartman

Two-dimensional conformal field theories with a large central charge and a small number of low-dimension operators are studied using the conformal block expansion. A universal formula is derived for the Renyi entropies of N disjoint intervals in the ground state, valid to all orders in a series expansion. This is possible because the full perturbative answer in this regime comes from the exchange of the stress tensor and other descendants of the vacuum state. Therefore, the Renyi entropy is related to the Virasoro vacuum block at large central charge. The entanglement entropy, computed from the Renyi entropy by an analytic continuation, decouples into a sum of single-interval entanglements. This field theory result agrees with the Ryu-Takayanagi formula for the holographic entanglement entropy of a 2d CFT, applied to any number of intervals, and thus can be interpreted as a microscopic calculation of the area of minimal surfaces in 3d gravity.

arXiv:1303.6955•Mar 27, 2013•260 citations

Monodromy methods for torus conformal blocks and entanglement entropy at large central charge

Marius Gerbershagen

Abstract We compute the entanglement entropy in a two dimensional conformal field theory at finite size and finite temperature in the large central charge limit via the replica trick. We first generalize the known monodromy method for the calculation of conformal blocks on the plane to the torus. Then, we derive a monodromy method for the zero-point conformal blocks of the replica partition function. We explain the differences between the two monodromy methods before applying them to the calculation of the entanglement entropy. We find that the contribution of the vacuum exchange dominates the entanglement entropy for a large class of CFTs, leading to universal results in agreement with holographic predictions from the RT formula. Moreover, we determine in which regime the replica partition function agrees with a correlation function of local twist operators on the torus.

arXiv:2101.11642•Journal of High Energy Physics•Aug 1, 2021•14 citations

Symmetry-resolved entanglement for excited states and two entangling intervals in AdS3/CFT2

Konstantin Weisenberger, Suting Zhao, Christian Northe +1 more

Abstract We test the proposal of [1] for the holographic computation of the charged moments and the resulting symmetry-resolved entanglement entropy in different excited states, as well as for two entangling intervals. Our holographic computations are performed in U(1) Chern-Simons-Einstein-Hilbert gravity, and are confirmed by independent results in a conformal field theory at large central charge. In particular, we consider two classes of excited states, corresponding to charged and uncharged conical defects in AdS3. In the conformal field theory, these states are generated by the insertion of charged and uncharged heavy operators. We employ the monodromy method to calculate the ensuing four-point function between the heavy operators and the twist fields. For the two-interval case, we derive our results on the AdS and the conformal field theory side, respectively, from the generating function method of [1], as well as the vertex operator algebra. In all cases considered, we find equipartition of entanglement between the different charge sectors. We also clarify an aspect of conformal field theories with a large central charge and $$ \hat{\mathfrak{u}}{(1)}_k $$ u ̂ 1 k Kac-Moody symmetry used in our calculations, namely the factorization of the Hilbert space into a gravitational Virasoro sector with large central charge, and a $$ \hat{\mathfrak{u}}{(1)}_k $$ u ̂ 1 k Kac-Moody sector.

arXiv:2108.09210•Journal of High Energy Physics•Dec 16, 2021•59 citations

Holographic Rényi entropy for CFT with W symmetry

Bin Chen, Jiang Long, Jiaju Zhang

In this paper we investigate the holographic Rényi entropy of two disjoint intervals on complex plane with small cross ratio x for conformal field theory with W symmetry in the ground state, which could be dual to a higher spin AdS3 gravity. We focus on the cases of W 3 and W 4 symmetries. In order to see the nontrivial contributions from the W fields, we calculate the Rényi entropy in the expansion of x to order x 8 in both the gravity and the CFT sides. In the gravity side the classical contributions to the entanglement entropy is still given by the Ryu-Takayanagi area formula under the reasonable assumption, while the 1-loop quantum corrections have to take into account of the contributions not only from massless gravitons, but also from massless higher spin fields. In the CFT side we still use the operator product expansion of twist operators in the small interval limit, but now we need to consider the quasiprimary fields constructed from W fields, besides the ones from Virasoro Verma module. In the large central charge limit, we obtain the classical, 1-loop, 2-loop, and 3-loop parts of the Rényi entropy. The classical and 1-loop results in the gravity and the CFT sides are in exact match. This confirms the higher spin gravity/CFT correspondence, and also supports the holographic computation of Rényi entanglement entropy, including the quantum correction, in both the AdS3 gravity and the higher spin AdS3 gravity.

arXiv:1312.5510•Journal of High Energy Physics•Apr 1, 2014•75 citations
We consider conformal blocks of two heavy operators and an arbitrary number of light operators in a (1+1)-d CFT with large central charge. Using the monodromy method, these higher-point conformal blocks are shown to factorize into products of 4-point conformal blocks in the heavy-light limit for a class of OPE channels. This result is reproduced by considering suitable worldline configurations in the bulk conical defect geometry. We apply the CFT results to calculate the entanglement entropy of an arbitrary number of disjoint intervals for heavy states. The corresponding holographic entanglement entropy calculated via the minimal area prescription precisely matches these results from CFT. Along the way, we briefly illustrate the relation of these conformal blocks to Riemann surfaces and their associated moduli space.
We consider the entanglement entropy in 2d conformal field theory in a class of excited states produced by the insertion of a heavy local operator. These include both high-energy eigenstates of the Hamiltonian and time-dependent local quenches. We compute the universal contribution from the stress tensor to the single interval Renyi entropies and entanglement entropy, and conjecture that this dominates the answer in theories with a large central charge and a sparse spectrum of low-dimension operators. The resulting entanglement entropies agree precisely with holographic calculations in three-dimensional gravity. High-energy eigenstates are dual to microstates of the BTZ black hole, so the corresponding holographic calculation is a geodesic length in the black hole geometry; agreement between these two answers demonstrates that these individual microstates of holographic CFTs effectively thermalize at the level of the single-interval entanglement entropy. For local quenches, the dual geometry is a highly boosted black hole or conical defect. On the CFT side, the rise in entanglement entropy after a quench is directly related to the monodromy of a Virasoro conformal block.
In this paper, we study the entanglement entropy in a large class of states of two-dimensional conformal field theory in the the large central charge limit. This class of states includes the states created by the insertion of a finite number of local heavy operators. By using the monodromy analysis, we obtain the leading order entanglement entropy for the general state. We show that it is exactly captured by the Ryu-Takayanagi formula, by using the Wilsonian line prescription in the Chern-Simons formulation of the AdS3 gravity.
Two-dimensional conformal field theories with a large central charge and a small number of low-dimension operators are studied using the conformal block expansion. A universal formula is derived for the Renyi entropies of N disjoint intervals in the ground state, valid to all orders in a series expansion. This is possible because the full perturbative answer in this regime comes from the exchange of the stress tensor and other descendants of the vacuum state. Therefore, the Renyi entropy is related to the Virasoro vacuum block at large central charge. The entanglement entropy, computed from the Renyi entropy by an analytic continuation, decouples into a sum of single-interval entanglements. This field theory result agrees with the Ryu-Takayanagi formula for the holographic entanglement entropy of a 2d CFT, applied to any number of intervals, and thus can be interpreted as a microscopic calculation of the area of minimal surfaces in 3d gravity.
Abstract We compute the entanglement entropy in a two dimensional conformal field theory at finite size and finite temperature in the large central charge limit via the replica trick. We first generalize the known monodromy method for the calculation of conformal blocks on the plane to the torus. Then, we derive a monodromy method for the zero-point conformal blocks of the replica partition function. We explain the differences between the two monodromy methods before applying them to the calculation of the entanglement entropy. We find that the contribution of the vacuum exchange dominates the entanglement entropy for a large class of CFTs, leading to universal results in agreement with holographic predictions from the RT formula. Moreover, we determine in which regime the replica partition function agrees with a correlation function of local twist operators on the torus.
Abstract We test the proposal of [1] for the holographic computation of the charged moments and the resulting symmetry-resolved entanglement entropy in different excited states, as well as for two entangling intervals. Our holographic computations are performed in U(1) Chern-Simons-Einstein-Hilbert gravity, and are confirmed by independent results in a conformal field theory at large central charge. In particular, we consider two classes of excited states, corresponding to charged and uncharged conical defects in AdS3. In the conformal field theory, these states are generated by the insertion of charged and uncharged heavy operators. We employ the monodromy method to calculate the ensuing four-point function between the heavy operators and the twist fields. For the two-interval case, we derive our results on the AdS and the conformal field theory side, respectively, from the generating function method of [1], as well as the vertex operator algebra. In all cases considered, we find equipartition of entanglement between the different charge sectors. We also clarify an aspect of conformal field theories with a large central charge and u^(1)k \hat{\mathfrak{u}}{(1)}_k u^(1)k​ u ̂ 1 k Kac-Moody symmetry used in our calculations, namely the factorization of the Hilbert space into a gravitational Virasoro sector with large central charge, and a u^(1)k \hat{\mathfrak{u}}{(1)}_k u^(1)k​ u ̂ 1 k Kac-Moody sector.
In this paper we investigate the holographic Rényi entropy of two disjoint intervals on complex plane with small cross ratio x for conformal field theory with W symmetry in the ground state, which could be dual to a higher spin AdS3 gravity. We focus on the cases of W 3 and W 4 symmetries. In order to see the nontrivial contributions from the W fields, we calculate the Rényi entropy in the expansion of x to order x 8 in both the gravity and the CFT sides. In the gravity side the classical contributions to the entanglement entropy is still given by the Ryu-Takayanagi area formula under the reasonable assumption, while the 1-loop quantum corrections have to take into account of the contributions not only from massless gravitons, but also from massless higher spin fields. In the CFT side we still use the operator product expansion of twist operators in the small interval limit, but now we need to consider the quasiprimary fields constructed from W fields, besides the ones from Virasoro Verma module. In the large central charge limit, we obtain the classical, 1-loop, 2-loop, and 3-loop parts of the Rényi entropy. The classical and 1-loop results in the gravity and the CFT sides are in exact match. This confirms the higher spin gravity/CFT correspondence, and also supports the holographic computation of Rényi entanglement entropy, including the quantum correction, in both the AdS3 gravity and the higher spin AdS3 gravity.