How General Is Holography?

Abstract

In this thesis I explore the generality of the holographic principle in 2+1 (bulk) dimensions by looking at the possibility of having holographic correspondences for non-AdS (higher-spin) spacetimes. The first part focuses on Lobachevsky spacetimes with $\mathfrak{sl}(4,\mathbb{R})$ as well as $\mathcal{W}^{(2)}_N$ symmetries, the asymptotic symmetry algebras and their unitary representations. This results in a family of unitary $\mathcal{W}^{(2)}_N$ models that can have both small and large central charge. The focus of the second part is a possible holographic correspondence in asymptotically flat spacetimes. This part covers limits from known AdS$_3$ results to flat space as well as a NO-GO result that forbids having flat space, higher-spins and unitarity at the same time. In addition this part shows how to consistently add (higher-spin) chemical potentials to flat space. As a non-trivial check of a holographic correspondence in flat space I provide a way to determine entanglement entropy (as well as thermal entropy of flat space cosmologies) holographically in asymptotically flat spacetimes using Wilson lines.

PhD Thesis; Defended on Sept. 7th, 2016; This thesis won the Victor-Franz Hess Prize awarded by the Austrian Physical Society