Theory HEP Seminar

Holographic description of the cosmological singularity

Misha Smolkin

Perimeter Institute

In my talk I will discuss our recent paper hep-th/1211.1322 where we construct a 3D conformal field theory dual to asymptotically AdS cosmology in four dimensions. Due to the scale invariance this dual theory allows an infinite family of instantons each of which breaks the conformal group O(3,2) down to O(3,1). These instantons are dual to bulk instantons responsible for nucleating an O(3,1) invariant cosmological bubble. Presumably they indicate an infinite instability rate, however we are able to sum over all of them completely. The resulting theory is manifestly stable, unitary and finite.