Research Seminars @ Illinois

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Tailored for undergraduate researchers, this calendar is a curated list of research seminars at the University of Illinois. Explore the diverse world of research and expand your knowledge through engaging sessions designed to inspire and enlighten.

To have your events added or removed from this calendar, please contact OUR at ugresearch@illinois.edu

Mathematical and Theoretical Physics Seminar: "Gravitational constraints, modular flow, and the information theory of UV divergences"

Event Type: Seminar/Symposium
Sponsor: Department of Physics
Location: LLP 464
Date: Mar 6, 2025 1:00 pm
Speaker: Jonathan Sorce, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Contact: Thierry Ramais
E-Mail: ramais@illinois.edu
Phone: 217-300-2044
Views: 217
Originating Calendar: Physics - Mathematical and Theoretical Physics Seminar; Abstract: In well behaved quantum field theories, all states are supposed to “look like the vacuum at short distances.” Making this statement precise, however, has been a serious challenge. One important reason to understand the universal short-distance structure in quantum field theory comes from the semiclassical approach to quantum gravity, where black hole “area operators” universally introduce a vacuum-like entanglement defect in the semiclassical Hilbert space. From this perspective, finding universal short-distance structure in quantum field theory would help to confirm the old notion that gravity smooths out naive divergences in the entanglement of quantum fields. In this talk I will explain the “boost conjecture” for modular flow, which is a sharp form of the universality of ultraviolet entanglement, then I will partially resolve the boost conjecture in free field theory by showing that states with non-vacuum-like modular flows cannot be constructed in the vacuum Hilbert space. Based on work in progress with Gautam Satishchandran.

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