Publications

Order by: publication date number of citations

• Bubbling saddles of the gravitational index

  Davide Cassani, Alejandro Ruipérez, Enrico Turetta

  SciPost Phys. 19, 134 (2025) · published 24 November 2025 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We consider the five-dimensional supergravity path integral that computes a supersymmetric index, and uncover a wealth of semiclassical saddles with bubbling topology. These are complex finite-temperature configurations asymptotic to $S^1×\mathbb{R}^4$, solving the supersymmetry equations. We assume a $\mathrm{U}(1)^3$ symmetry given by the thermal isometry and two rotations, and present a general construction based on a rod structure specifying the fixed loci of the $\mathrm{U}(1)$ isometries and their three-dimensional topology. These fixed loci may correspond to multiple horizons or three-dimensional bubbles, and they may have $S^3$, $S^2× S^1$, or lens space topology. Allowing for conical singularities gives additional topologies involving spindles and branched spheres or branched lens spaces. As a particularly significant example, we analyze in detail the configurations with a horizon and a bubble just outside of it. We determine the possible saddle-point contribution of these configurations to the gravitational index by evaluating their on-shell action and the relevant thermodynamic relations. We also spell out two limits leading to well-defined Lorentzian solutions. The first is the extremal limit, which gives the known BPS black ring and black lens solutions. The on-shell action and chemical potentials remain well-defined in this limit and should thus provide the contribution of the black ring and black lens to the gravitational index. The second is a limit leading to horizonless bubbling solutions, which have purely imaginary action.

• An overview of lattice results for parton distribution functions

  Luigi Del Debbio

  SciPost Phys. Proc. 15, 028 (2024) · published 3 April 2024 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  Following a ground-breaking proposal by Ji [Phys. Rev. Lett. 110, 262002 (2013)], numerical simulations of Quantum Chromo Dynamics (QCD) on a Euclidean lattice have provided new, valuable information on the structure of hadrons. In this talk, we briefly review the lattice approach to the reconstruction of parton densities, highlighting the connection between lattice observables and parton densities, with a focus on theoretical issues. Since parton distributions are extracted from lattice data by solving an inverse problem, we discuss some of the difficulties that affect these determinations and how they can be formulated in a Bayesian framework.

• How the blast-wave model describes PID hadron spectra from 5 TeV p-Pb collisions

  Thomas A. Trainor

  SciPost Phys. Proc. 15, 025 (2024) · published 3 April 2024 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  The blast-wave (BW) spectrum model has been applied extensively to nucleus-nucleus collision data with the intention to demonstrate formation of a quark-gluon plasma (QGP) in more-central A-A collisions. More recently the BW model has been applied to p-p, d-Au and p-Pb collisions. Such results are interpreted to indicate that "collectivity" (flows) and QGP appear in smaller systems. In this talk I review BW analysis of identified-hadron spectra from 5 TeV p-Pb collisions and examine the shape evolution of model spectra with collision centrality. I evaluate data-model fit quality using conventional statistical measures. I conclude that the BW model is not a valid data model.

• The role of atomic interactions in cavity-induced continuous time crystals

  Christian Høj Johansen, Johannes Lang, Francesco Piazza

  SciPost Phys. 17, 089 (2024) · published 24 September 2024 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We consider continuous time-crystalline phases in dissipative many-body systems of atoms in cavities, focusing on the role of short-range interatomic interactions. First, we show that the latter can alter the nature of the time crystal by changing the type of the underlying critical bifurcation. Second, we characterize the heating mechanism and dynamics resulting from the short-range interactions and demonstrate that they make the time crystal inherently metastable. We argue this is generic for the broader class of dissipative time crystals in atom-cavity systems whenever the cavity loss rate is comparable to the atomic recoil energy. We observe that such a scenario for heating has several similarities to the one proposed for preheating in the early universe, where the oscillating coherent inflation field decays into a cascade of exponentially growing fluctuations. By extending approaches for dissipative dynamical systems to our many-body problem, we obtain analytical predictions for the parameters describing the phase transition and the heating rate inside the time-crystalline phase. We underpin and extend the analytical predictions of the heating rates with numerical simulations, which also show that the metastable regime exists when the inherent stochastic nature is taken into account.

• Results on high energy galactic cosmic rays from the DAMPE space mission

  Leandro Silveri on behalf of the DAMPE Collaboration

  SciPost Phys. Proc. 13, 012 (2023) · published 28 September 2023 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  DAMPE (Dark Matter Particle Explorer) is a satellite-born experiment launched in 2015 in a sun-synchronous orbit at 500 km altitude, and it has been taking data in stable conditions ever since. Its main goals include the spectral measurements up to very high energies, cosmic electrons/positrons and gamma rays up to tens of TeV, and protons and nuclei up to hundreds of TeV. The detector's main features include the 32 radiation lengths deep calorimeter and large geometric acceptance, making DAMPE one of the most powerful space instruments in operation, covering with high statistics and small systematics the high energy frontier up to several hundreds TeV. The results of spectral measurements of different species are shown and discussed.

• Spin-orbit photonics in a fixed cavity: Harnessing Bogoliubov modes of a Bose-Einstein condensate

  Ghaisud Din, Muqaddar Abbas, Pei Zhang

  SciPost Phys. Core 8, 082 (2025) · published 12 November 2025 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We present a theoretical investigation of spin-orbit photonics within a fixed mirror cavity system containing a Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC), in which the Bogoliubov excitation modes of the condensate are treated as effective mechanical oscillators. By embedding the condensate in a single-mode optical cavity, we explore the emergence and modulation of the photonic spin Hall effect (PSHE) through the spin-dependent transverse shifts of a weak probe field. The optical response —encoded in the real and imaginary components of the output field susceptibility— is systematically analyzed as a function of the condensate-cavity coupling strength, revealing a controllable enhancement or suppression of the spin-orbit interaction. Our model captures how the interplay between collective BEC excitations and cavity photon dynamics induces nontrivial modifications in spin-dependent light propagation. Notably, we uncover that the Bogoliubov mode coupling acts as a tunable channel for mediating spin angular momentum transfer within the cavity, offering a novel route for engineering compact, quantum-coherent spin-orbit photonic devices.

• Probabilistic deconstruction of a theory of gravity, part II: Curved space

  Sunok Josephine Suh

  SciPost Phys. 16, 012 (2024) · published 17 January 2024 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We propose that the underlying context of holographic duality and the Ryu-Takayanagi formula is that the volume measure of spacetime is a probability measure constrained by quantum dynamics. We define quantum stochastic processes using joint quantum distributions which are realized in a quantum system as expectation values of products of projectors. In anti-de Sitter JT gravity, we show that Einstein's equations arise from the evolution of probability under the quantum stochastic process induced by the boundary, with the area of compactified space in the gravitational theory identified as a probability density evolving under the quantum process. Extrapolating these and related results in flat JT gravity found in [SciPost Phys. 15, 174 (2023)], we conjecture that general relativity arises in the semi-classical limit of the evolution of probability with respect to quantum stochastic processes.

• The acceptance speech of the 2022 Weyl-Wigner award

  Nicolai Reshetikhin

  SciPost Phys. Proc. 14, 003 (2023) · published 23 November 2023 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  This is the acceptance speech for the 2022 Weyl-Wigner award.

• Can $\overline{MS}$ parton distributions be negative?

  Alessandro Candido, Stefano Forte, Felix Hekhorn

  SciPost Phys. Proc. 8, 077 (2022) · published 12 July 2022 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We review our recent paper, where we proved Parton distributions functions (PDFs) to be positive at NLO in the $\overline{MS}$ factorization scheme. We present some additional material that was useful in completing the steps for the actual proof, but we won't attempt to report on the full proof, but referring the reader to the paper itself.

• Analytical expression for $\pi$-ton vertex contributions to the optical conductivity

  Juraj Krsnik, Anna Kauch, Karsten Held

  SciPost Phys. 18, 138 (2025) · published 25 April 2025 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  Vertex corrections from the transversal particle-hole channel, so-called $\pi$-tons, are generic in models for strongly correlated electron systems and can lead to a displaced Drude peak (DDP). Here, we derive the analytical expression for these $\pi$-tons, and how they affect the optical conductivity as a function of correlation length $\xi$, fermion lifetime $\tau$, temperature $T$, and coupling strength to spin or charge fluctuations $g$. In particular, for $T\rightarrow T_c$, the critical temperature for antiferromagnetic or charge ordering, the dc vertex correction is algebraic $\sigma_{VERT}^{dc}\propto \xi \sim (T-T_c)^{-\nu}$ in one dimension and logarithmic $\sigma_{VERT}^{dc}\propto \ln\xi \sim \nu \ln (T-T_c)$ in two dimensions. Here, $\nu$ is the critical exponent for the correlation length. If we have the exponential scaling $\xi \sim e^{1/T}$ of an ideal two-dimensional system, the DDP becomes more pronounced with increasing $T$ but fades away at low temperatures where only a broadening of the Drude peak remains, as it is observed experimentally, with the dc resistivity exhibiting a linear $T$ dependence at low temperatures. Further, we find the maximum of the DPP to be given by the inverse lifetime: $\omega_{DDP} \sim 1/\tau$. These characteristic dependencies can guide experiments to evidence $\pi$-tons in actual materials.