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H2020Individual fellowship2018–2020

Amplitudes Bootstrap · The Bootstrap Method for General Amplitudes

Horizon 2020 — Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions

Duration
2018-08-15 → 2020-08-14
EU contribution
€200,195
Participants
1
Scheme
MSCA-IF

Lines connect the coordinator with its partners.

Results in brief

The Bootstrap Method for General Amplitudes

If physicists want to discover new physics beyond our Standard Model, we must first understand what the Standard Model predicts. For experiments like the Large Hadron Collider at CERN, this means calculating scattering amplitudes, formulas that let us find the probability that two colliding particles will bounce, or “scatter”, off each other in particular ways. Current methods to calculate scattering amplitudes are very computationally intensive, but a much more efficient option exists: we can “bootstrap” the amplitudes, starting with a guess in terms of the right kind of mathematical functions then constraining it using what we know about the physics of the problem. This method can be extremely effective, but it does rely on some initial knowledge: both of the right functions, and of the relevant physics. The objective of this project was to broaden the reach of bootstrap methods, both by investigating new types of mathematical function and by using the bootstrap in new physical contexts. In the course of the project I discovered a new class of functions appearing in scattering amplitudes, related to geometric spaces called Calabi-Yau manifolds, and characterized their properties. I also made progress building knowledge of the physics of new contexts to serve as a foundation for future bootstrap methods.

Data: CORDIS, © European Union

Project objective

Scattering amplitudes are our primary window on fundamental physics, but despite spectacular advances in recent years their computation remains extremely computationally intensive. Bootstrap techniques, in which an ansatz for the amplitude is constrained with limited kinematic data, are in principle the most efficient possible method, allowing researchers to skip both long sums over diagrams and complicated multidimensional integrals. My collaborators and I have shown the power of these techniques in six particle amplitudes up to six loops, quantities complex enough to be inaccessible to other methods. So far, though, we have applied these techniques only in planar maximally supersymmetric Yang-Mills theory. In this project, my objective is to generalize these techniques beyond the supersymmetric case, to build it into a powerful general tool for computing scattering amplitudes. I will pursue this objective in two ways: by investigating amplitudes that require functions outside of the polylogarithms that were used in earlier cases, and by bootstrapping quantities, such as correlation functions and amplitudes in non-planar theories, that have more general behavior.

Original text from CORDIS.

Participants

  • KOBENHAVNS UNIVERSITET · KOBENHAVNCoordinatorDenmark

Links

Data: CORDIS, © European Union