Exact Correlators from Conformal Ward Identities in Momentum Space and the Perturbative $TJJ$ Vertex

TL;DR

The paper develops a momentum-space conformal bootstrap framework for three-point functions, focusing on the TJJ vertex and its anomaly structure. By applying the BMS reconstruction method and a novel Fuchsian analysis, it derives primary and secondary conformal Ward identities and demonstrates their universal solution in terms of hypergeometric functions, while connecting to perturbative one-loop results in QED/scalar QED. It shows that anomaly poles arise from renormalization and massless exchanges, and that one-loop field content suffices to reproduce nonperturbative results in several dimensions (e.g., d=3,4,5), with explicit mappings between form-factor bases. The work thus links exact conformal constraints with perturbative master integrals (B0, C0) and validates the momentum-space approach as a robust tool for bootstrap analyses of higher-point functions.

Abstract

We present a general study of 3-point functions of conformal field theory in momentum space, following a reconstruction method for tensor correlators, based on the solution of the conformal Ward identities (CWI' s), introduced in recent works by Bzowski, McFadden and Skenderis (BMS). We investigate and detail the structure of the CWI's, their non-perturbative solutions and the transition to momentum space, comparing them to perturbation theory by taking QED as an example. We then proceed with an analysis of the $TJJ$ correlator, presenting independent and detailed re-derivations of the conformal equations in the reconstruction method of BMS, originally formulated using a minimal tensor basis in the transverse traceless sector. A careful comparison with a second basis introduced in previous studies shows that this correlator is affected by one anomaly pole in the graviton (T) line, induced by renormalization. The result shows that the origin of the anomaly, in this correlator, should be necessarily attributed to the exchange of a massless effective degree of freedom. Our results are then exemplified in massless QED at one-loop in $d$-dimensions, expressed in terms of perturbative master integrals. An independent analysis of the Fuchsian character of the solutions, which bypasses the 3K integrals, is also presented. We show that the combination of field theories at one-loop - with a specific field content of degenerate massless scalar and fermions - is sufficient to generate the complete non-perturbative solution, in agreement with a previous study in coordinate space. The result shows that free conformal field theories, in specific dimensions, arrested at one-loop, reproduce the general result for the $TJJ$. Analytical checks of this correspondence are presented in $d=3,4$ and $5$ spacetime dimensions[..].

Figures (3)

• Figure 1: One-loop diagrams for the TJJ in QED (continuous fermion lines). A similar set of diagrams describes the scalar QED case (dashed lines), by replacing the internal fermion with a charged scalar.
• Figure 2: The vertices in QED and scalar QED.
• Figure 3: Fig. (a): Dispersive description of the singularity of the spectral density $\rho(s)$ as a spacetime process. Fig. (b): The exchange of a pole as the origin of the conformal anomaly in the TJJ viewed in perturbation theory.