Search Talks

Bell’s theorem is typically understood as proof that quantum theory is incompatible with local hidden variable (LHV) models. In recent years, however, LHV models have been recognized as a particular and simple case of much more general causal networks that can give rise to new and stronger forms of nonclassicality. And, since nonlocality is a resource in a variety of applications, it is thus natural to ask whether these novel forms of nonclassical behavior can also be put to use in information processing. In this seminar, I will present recent results exploring quantum correlations in several such causal scenarios, ranging from foundational questions such as freedom of choice in Bell experiments to more applied situations covering cryptography, distributed computing, and game theory.

Zoom Link: TBD

In this talk, we will discuss the late time behavior of out of time ordered correlators (OTOC). First part of the talk, we argue the nonlinear behavior of OTOC for general chaotic system is controlled by a Dray t’Hooft like action. Second part of the talk, we will discuss the late time nonperturbative effects in OTOC and its relation with random unitary behavior.

Higgs inflation introduces a large non-minimal coupling between the Ricci scalar and Higgs that makes the cut-off scale well below the Planck scale. In the first part of the talk, we show that unitarity is indeed violated by a resonant production of longitudinal gauge bosons after inflation, calling for UV completion of Higgs inflation. We then show that unitarity is restored after summing over vacuum polarization-type diagrams that are leading-order in the large-N limit. Scattering amplitude develops a pole after the resummation, which we identify as the scalar component of the metric, or the scalaron. This phenomenon can be understood in the language of the non-linear sigma model (NLSM), with the scalaron identified as the sigma-meson that linearizes the NLSM.

Zoom Link: https://pitp.zoom.us/j/98015814051?pwd=YWdrWTJzbzJkdnFXRUxPWFJnNXVNQT09

Most of the efforts in searching for dark energy (DE) have focused on its gravitational signatures, and in particular on constraining its equation of state. However, there is a lot to be learned about DE by getting off the beaten track. I will first focus on non-gravitational interactions of DE with visible matter, leading to the possibility of "direct detection of dark energy" (analogous to direct detection of dark matter): I will argue that such interactions can and potentially may already have been detected in experiments such as XENON1T, while discussing complementary cosmological and astrophysical signatures. I will then discuss early- and late-time consistency tests of LCDM, and how these may shed light on (early and late) DE in relation to the Hubble tension. I will present two such tests based on the early ISW effect and the ages of the oldest astrophysical objects in the Universe.

A basic calculation in QFT is the construction of the Yukawa potential from a tree-level scattering amplitude. In the massless limit, this reproduces the 1/r potential. For gravity, scattering mediated by a massless graviton is thus consistent with the Newtonian potential.

In de Sitter spacetime, the cosmological constant gives rise to a mass-like term in the graviton propagator. This raises the question what the classical potential looks like when taking into account curvature effects.

In this talk, I will introduce an operator-based formalism to compute scattering amplitudes in curved spacetime, and I will show how to construct the Newtonian potential in a dS background. Remarkably, the potential gives rise to an additional repulsive force, and encodes the de Sitter horizon in a novel and non-trivial way.

With the release of the third gravitational wave transient catalog (GWTC-3), the LIGO and Virgo detectors have reported nearly 100 gravitational waves from colliding black holes and neutron stars. Among these detections there have been numerous surprises, such as the heavy GW190521, the confidently asymmetric GW190412, and the exceptionally small secondary of GW190814. In addition to analyses of each individual sources' properties, such as their masses and spins, one can also summarize the collective properties of the colliding objects as population probability distributions over these parameters. As catalog sizes continue to grow, it enables both finer grained investigations into the population properties of merging compact objects, and robustly testing GR in the strong gravity regime. In this talk I will present data driven statistical models to look for deviations to underlying theoretical expectations, both for individual gravitational waveform models and population models describing the astrophysical distributions of merging compact binaries. I will present the results of an analysis using this novel data-driven model on the 11 compact binary mergers in GWTC-1, then move towards hierarchical models, inferring the binary black hole mass distribution with similar data-driven methods. I will conclude with showing new results from the LVK population analyses of GWTC-3 and motivate the need towards developing more data-driven statistical models for the incoming swath of observations expected in the fourth observing run that, as we have seen, will likely continue to further challenge theoretical expectations.