The question of boundary conditions in conformal field theories is discussed, in the light of recent progress. Two kinds of boundary conditions are examined, along open boundaries of the system, or along closed curves or ``seams''. Solving consistency conditions known as Cardy equation is shown to amount to the algebraic problem of finding integer valued representations of (one or two copies of) the fusion algebra. Graphs encode these boundary conditions in a natural way, but are also relevant in several aspects of physics ``in the bulk''. Quantum algebras attached to these graphs contain information on structure constants of the operator algebra, on the Boltzmann weights of the corresponding integrable lattice models etc. Thus the study of boundary conditions in Conformal Field Theory offers a new perspective on several old physical problems and offers an explicit realisation of recent mathematical concepts.
The question of boundary conditions in conformal field theories is discussed, in the light of recent progress. Two kinds of boundary conditions are examined, along open boundaries of the system, or along closed curves or seams''. Solving consistency conditions known as Cardy equation is shown to amount to the algebraic problem of finding integer valued representations of (one or two copies of) the fusion algebra. Graphs encode these boundary conditions in a natural way, but are also relevant in several aspects of physics in the bulk''. Quantum algebras attached to these graphs contain information on structure constants of the operator algebra, on the Boltzmann weights of the corresponding integrable lattice models etc. Thus the study of boundary conditions in Conformal Field Theory offers a new perspective on several old physical problems and offers an explicit realisation of recent mathematical concepts.
Open descendants extend Conformal Field Theory to unoriented surfaces with boundaries. The construction rests on two types of generalizations of the fusion algebra. The first is needed even in the relatively simple case of diagonal models. It leads to a new tensor that satisfies the fusion algebra, but whose entries are signed integers. The second is needed when dealing with non-diagonal models, where Cardy's ansatz does not apply. It leads to a new tensor with positive integer entries, that satisfies a set of polynomial equations and encodes the classification of the allowed boundary operators.
We have gathered quite a large amount of technology to construct conformal boundary conditions and study their properties. So far, most of the tools relied on detailed knowledge of the underlying algebraic structure of conformal field theories (CFTs), such as representations of symmetry algebras and modular transformations. In almost all cases, this route will lead to a restricted class of boundary conditions only, favouring those that preserve a lot of symmetry. In “real life applications” of boundary CFT, arising in string theory, in condensed matter physics, or in the study of integrable models, we are often faced with situations where we start from a simple given boundary condition and then “deform” by “turning on perturbations”. In this chapter, we will discuss methods aimed at making this procedure well defined and at determining the perturbed boundary theory. Most of the time, we will restrict ourselves to pure boundary perturbations, which leave the bulk CFT untouched. We will sometimes be led to new boundary conditions that would have been difficult to find directly. The total space of boundary CFTs takes the form of a fibration over the moduli space of bulk theories, with the fibre over each point made up from all boundary conditions (branes) that exist for that bulk theory. Marginal boundary deformations, if they exist, will generate, starting from a single boundary condition, whole continuous families within this boundary moduli space.
This thesis explores the application of numerical bootstrap techniques to two-point functions of bulk insertions in the presence of a boundary in two-dimensional conformal field theories. The first part of this thesis is devoted to presenting a comprehensive introduction to essential concepts in the numerical bootstrap of two-dimensional CFTs. Namely, an extensive introduction to the basics of conformal field theories (CFTs), their properties arising from the algebraic structure of conformal transformations, consitency conditions on the observables in a CFT, as well as the effects of the presence of defects in two-dimensional CFTs, is given. This is followed by a quick recount of the numerical techniques employed in the literature to solve for the aforementioned consistency conditions. These chapters form an overview of the seminal works that set the backdrop of the contributions made in the second part of the thesis. In the contributions of the thesis, we discuss the progress made in the investigations in (Meineri and Radhakrishnan 2025) where two-point functions in BCFTs are bootstrapped by treating them as a part of a larger system of consistency conditions involving the partition function on an annulus, the two-point function in the presence of a boundary, and four-point functions on the infinite plane. This perspective of treating the two-point function as a part of a larger system makes accessible parts of the BCFT data that have so-far remained inaccessible, and we present results on the boundary gap in the two-point function, and improvements in existing numerical bounds on the boundary entropy.
We present a model-independent study of boundary states in the Cardy case that covers all conformal field theories for which the representation category of the chiral algebra is a – not necessarily semisimple – modular tensor category. This class, which we call finite CFTs, includes all rational theories, but goes much beyond these, and in particular comprises many logarithmic conformal field theories. We show that the following two postulates for a Cardy case are compatible beyond rational CFT and lead to a universal description of boundary states that realizes a standard mathematical setup: First, for bulk fields, the pairing of left and right movers is given by (a coend involving) charge conjugation; and second, the boundary conditions are given by the objects of the category of chiral data. For rational theories our proposal reproduces the familiar result for the boundary states of the Cardy case. Further, with the help of sewing we compute annulus amplitudes. Our results show in particular that these possess an interpretation as partition functions, a constraint that for generic finite CFTs is much more restrictive than for rational ones.
We study integrable realizations of conformal twisted boundary conditions for s ℓ(2) unitary minimal models on a torus. These conformal field theories are realized as the continuum scaling limit of critical G = A , D , E lattice models with positive spectral parameter u > 0 and Coxeter number g . Integrable seams are constructed by fusing blocks of elementary local face weights. The usual A -type fusions are labelled by the Kac labels ( r , s ) and are associated with the Verlinde fusion algebra. We introduce a new type of fusion in the two braid limits u → ±i ∞ associated with the graph fusion algebra, and labelled by nodes a , b ∊ G respectively. When combined with automorphisms, they lead to general integrable seams labelled by x = ( r , a , b , κ) ∊ ( A g −2 , H , H , 2 ) where H is the graph G for type I theories and its parent for type II theories. Identifying our construction labels with the conformal labels of Petkova and Zuber, we find that the integrable seams are in one-to-one correspondence with the conformal seams. The distinct seams are thus associated with the nodes of the Ocneanu quantum graph. The quantum symmetries and twisted partition functions are checked numerically for | G | ≤ 6. We also show, in the case of D 2ℓ , that the non-commutativity of the Ocneanu algebra of seams arises because the automorphisms do not commute with the fusions.