English

(Non)-projective bounds on gravitational EFT

High Energy Physics - Theory 2023-03-16 v2

Abstract

In this paper we study both projective and non-projective constraints on four-dimensional gravitational effective fields theories implied from unitarity, causality and crossing, assuming perturbative UV completions in MplM_{\rm pl}. We derive bounds on the Wilson coefficients of R3R^3 and D2nR4D^{2n}R^4 from its dispersive representation, utilizing both numerical semi-definite programming and analytic geometry analysis. From the former, we derive projective bounds on ratios of couplings and observe accumulation point spectrum populating the boundary of the allowed region. For the latter we consider the non-projective geometry of the EFThedron, which we relate to the known LL-moment problem in the literature. This allows us to move beyond positivity and incorporate the upper bound from unitarity of the imaginary parts of partial waves. This leads to sharp bounds on individual coefficients, which are of order unity when normalized with respect to the UV scale. Finally, the non-projective geometry also allows us to derive optimal bounds reflecting assumptions of low-spin dominance, improving previous results. We complement the analytic analysis with a simple linear programming approach that validates the bounds.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2201.07177,
  title  = {(Non)-projective bounds on gravitational EFT},
  author = {Li-Yuan Chiang and Yu-tin Huang and Wei Li and Laurentiu Rodina and He-Chen Weng},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2201.07177},
  year   = {2023}
}

Comments

46 pages

R2 v1 2026-06-24T08:54:13.578Z