Non-unitary Wightman CFTs and non-unitary vertex algebras
Abstract
We give an equivalence of categories between: (i) M\"obius vertex algebras which are equipped with a choice of generating family of quasiprimary vectors, and (ii) (not-necessarily-unitary) M\"obius-covariant Wightman conformal field theories on the unit circle. We do not impose any technical restrictions on the theories considered (such as finite-dimensional conformal weight spaces or simplicity), yielding the most general equivalence between these two axiomatizations of two-dimensional chiral conformal field theory. This provides new opportunities to study non-unitary vertex algebras using the lens of algebraic conformal field theory and operator algebras, which we demonstrate by establishing a non-unitary version of the Reeh-Schlieder theorem.
Keywords
Cite
@article{arxiv.2409.08454,
title = {Non-unitary Wightman CFTs and non-unitary vertex algebras},
author = {Sebastiano Carpi and Christopher Raymond and Yoh Tanimoto and James E. Tener},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2409.08454},
year = {2025}
}
Comments
46 pages. Version 2 has minor revisions to match the published version