English

A Matrix Model for WZW

High Energy Physics - Theory 2016-08-24 v3 Strongly Correlated Electrons

Abstract

We study a U(N) gauged matrix quantum mechanics which, in the large N limit, is closely related to the chiral WZW conformal field theory. This manifests itself in two ways. First, we construct the left-moving Kac-Moody algebra from matrix degrees of freedom. Secondly, we compute the partition function of the matrix model in terms of Schur and Kostka polynomials and show that, in the large NN limit, it coincides with the partition function of the WZW model. This same matrix model was recently shown to describe non-Abelian quantum Hall states and the relationship to the WZW model can be understood in this framework.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1604.05711,
  title  = {A Matrix Model for WZW},
  author = {Nick Dorey and David Tong and Carl Turner},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1604.05711},
  year   = {2016}
}

Comments

28 pages + appendices. v2: references added. v3: another reference, version to be published in JHEP

R2 v1 2026-06-22T13:36:09.687Z