Talks

Precision atom interferometry is poised to become a powerful tool for discovery in fundamental physics.  Towards this end, I will describe recent, record-breaking atom interferometry experiments performed in a 10-meter drop tower that demonstrate long-lived quantum superposition states with macroscopic spatial separations.  The potential of this type of sensor is only beginning to be realized, and the ongoing march toward higher sensitivity can enable a diverse science impact, including laboratory tests of general relativity and the equivalence principle, searches for dark matter, probes of quantum mechanics, and detection of gravitational waves.  With the recent LIGO results, gravitational wave astronomy is particularly compelling since it provides a new window into the universe, collecting information about astrophysical systems and cosmology that is difficult or impossible to acquire by other methods.  Atom interferometric gravitational wave detection offers a number of advantages over traditional approaches, including simplified detector geometries, access to low frequencies that are complementary to LIGO, and substantially reduced antenna baselines.

Quantum theory can be understood as a theory of information processing in the circuit framework for operational probabilistic theories. This approach presupposes a definite casual structure as well as a preferred time direction. But in general relativity, the causal structure of space-time is dynamical and not predefined, which indicates that a quantum theory that could incorporate gravity requires a more general operational paradigm. In this talk, I will describe recent progress in this direction. First, I will show how relaxing the assumption that local operations take place in a global causal structure leads to a generalized framework that unifies all signaling and non-signaling quantum correlations in space-time via an extension of the density matrix called the process matrix. This framework also contains a new kind of correlations incompatible with any definite causal structure, which violate causal inequalities, the general theory of which I am going to present. I will then present an extension of the process matrix framework, in which no predefined causal structure is assumed even locally. This is based on a more general, time-neutral notion of operation, which leads to new insights into the problem of time-reversal symmetry in quantum mechanics, the meaning of causality, and the fact that we remember the past but not the future. In the resultant generalized formulation of quantum theory, operations are associated with regions that can be connected in networks with no directionality assumed for the connections. The theory is compatible with timelike loops and other acausal structures.

I will discuss a class of non-compact solutions to the Strominger-Hull system, the first order system of equations for preserving N=1 supersymmetry in heterotic compactifications to four dimensions. The solutions consists of the conifold and its Z2 orbifold with Abelian gauge fields and non-zero three-form flux. The heterotic Bianchi Identity is solved in a large charge limit of the gauge fields, where it is shown that the topological term p1(TX) can be consistently neglected. At large distances, these solutions are locally Ricci-flat. For a given flux, the family of solutions has three real parameters, the size of the pair of two spheres in the IR and the dilaton zero mode. There exists an explicit analytic solution for the decoupled near horizon region where for a given flux, the size of the cycles is frozen and the only parameter is the dilaton zero mode. This near horizon region also has an exactly solvable worldsheet CFT. When one of the two cycles has vanishing size the near horizon region disappears, but a solution on the unorbifolded resolved conifold still exists.

Asymptotically AdS spacetimes with reflecting boundary conditions represent a natural setting for studying superradiant instabilities of rotating or charged black holes. In the first part of this talk, I prove that all asymptotically AdS black holes with ergoregions in dimension d ≥ 4 are linearly unstable to gravitational perturbations. This proof uses the canonical energy method of Hollands and Wald in a WKB limit. In the second part of the talk, I consider a charged Reissner-Nordstrom-AdS black hole---which is superradiantly unstable to charged scalar field perturbations at the linear level---and study the full *nonlinear* evolution of the instability. In this special case, the instability occurs even for spherically symmetric perturbations, which simplifies the analysis and allows for the use of numerical general relativity simulations. Our results show that nonlinear backreaction causes the black hole to lose charge and mass to the scalar field as the instability proceeds. Eventually, higher scalar field harmonics become nonsuperradiant, and they are reabsorbed into the black hole. The final state is described by a “hairy” black hole, surrounded by a scalar condensate in the fundamental (lowest) mode. I discuss implications of this work on the original problem of the rotating black hole superradiant instability.

The kinetic Sunyaev-Zel'dovich effect is a direct probe of the distribution and velocity of electrons on cosmological scales.  Recent progress in Cosmic Microwave Background observations allow statistical detections of this subtle effect originating from a number of different tracers populations.  In my talk, I will review the observational status, highlight the consequences for astrophysics and cosmology and discuss future directions.