Related papers: On the trace anomaly of Chaudhuri-Choi-Rabinovici …
Recent conjectures of the c-theorem in four and higher dimensions have suggested that the coefficient of the Euler characteristic in the trace anomaly could measure the degrees of freedom in field theory and decrease along the…
There is no known obstructions, but we have not been aware of any concrete examples, either. The Wess-Zumino consistency condition for the conformal anomaly says that $a$ cannot change but does not say anything about $c$. In supersymmetric…
In this note we study four dimensional theories with N=3 superconformal symmetry, that do not also have N=4 supersymmetry. No examples of such theories are known, but their existence is also not ruled out. We analyze several properties that…
The trace anomaly for a conformally invariant scalar field theory on a curved manifold of positive constant curvature with boundary is considered. In the context of a perturbative evaluation of the theory's effective action explicit…
The two-point function of exactly marginal operators leads to a universal contribution to the trace anomaly in even dimensions. We study aspects of this trace anomaly, emphasizing its interpretation as a sigma model, whose target space M is…
The structure of type A and B trace anomalies is reanalyzed in terms of the universal behaviour of dimension -2 invariant amplitudes. Based on it a general argument for trace anomaly matching between the unbroken and broken phases of a CFT…
We investigate a possibility of scale invariant but non-conformal supersymmetric field theories from a perturbative approach. The explicit existence of monotonically decreasing a-function that generates beta-functions as a gradient flow…
We deform a defect conformal field theory by an exactly marginal bulk operator and we consider the dependence on the marginal coupling of flat and spherical defect expectation values. For even dimensional spherical defects we find a…
The trace anomaly and anomaly-induced action are evaluated for the two-dimensional $2D$ vector theory with classical conformal symmetry. Implementing local conformal symmetry while preserving the gauge invariance requires either giving up…
We consider the 4-dimensional $\mathcal{N}=1$ Lie superconformal algebra and search for completely "symmetric" (in the graded sense) 3-index invariant tensors. The solution we find is unique and we show that the corresponding invariant…
I give an account of my involvement with the chiral anomaly, and with the nonrenormalization theorem for the chiral anomaly and the all orders calculation of the trace anomaly, as well as related work by others. I then briefly discuss…
We carry out a three-loop computation that establishes the existence of scale without conformal invariance in dimensional regularization with the MS scheme in d=4-epsilon spacetime dimensions. We also comment on the effects of scheme…
We study the problem of finding exactly marginal deformations of N=1 superconformal field theories in four dimensions. We find that the only way a marginal chiral operator can become not exactly marginal is for it to combine with a…
Using a result of Longo and Xu, we show that the anomaly arising from a cyclic permutation orbifold of order 3 of a holomorphic conformal net $\mathcal A$ with central charge $c=8k$ depends on the "gravitational anomaly" $k\pmod 3$. In…
The general form of the stress-tensor three-point function in four dimensions is obtained by solving the Ward identities for the diffeomorphism and Weyl symmetries. Several properties of this correlator are discussed, such as the…
The majority of renormalizable field theories possessing the scale invariance at the classical level exhibits the trace anomaly once quantum corrections are taken into account. This leads to the breaking of scale and conformal invariance.…
I identify the class of even-dimensional conformal field theories that is most similar to two-dimensional conformal field theory. In this class the formula, elaborated recently, for the irreversibility of the renormalization-group flow…
Paying attention to conformal invariance as the invariance under local transformations of units of measure, we take a conformal invariant quantum field as a quantum matter theory in which one has the freedom to choose the values of units of…
For a conformal theory it is natural to seek the conformal moduli space, M_c to which it belongs, generated by the exactly marginal deformations. By now we should have the tools to determine M_c in the presence of enough supersymmetry. Here…
The trace anomaly of conformal field theories in four dimensions is characterized by '$a$' and '$c$'-functions. The scaling properties of the effective action of a CFT in the presence of boundaries is shown to be determined by $a$, $c$ and…