English

Holographic Gauge Theories in Background Fields and Surface Operators

High Energy Physics - Theory 2008-11-26 v2

Abstract

We construct a new class of supersymmetric surface operators in N=4 SYM and find the corresponding dual supergravity solutions. We show that the insertion of the surface operator - which is given by a WZW model supported on the surface - appears by integrating out the localized degrees of freedom along the surface which arise microscopically from a D3/D7 brane intersection. Consistency requires constructing N=4 SYM in the D7 supergravity background and not in flat space. This enlarges the class of holographic gauge theories dual to string theory backgrounds to gauge theories in non-trivial supergravity backgrounds. The dual Type IIB supergravity solutions we find reveal - among other features - that the holographic dual gauge theory does indeed live in the D7-brane background.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.0710.5170,
  title  = {Holographic Gauge Theories in Background Fields and Surface Operators},
  author = {Evgeny I. Buchbinder and Jaume Gomis and Filippo Passerini},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:0710.5170},
  year   = {2008}
}

Comments

42 pages, harvmac, corrected typos

R2 v1 2026-06-21T09:37:01.586Z