paper

Transport Properties of Holographic Defects

arXiv:0811.0480 · doi:10.1088/1126-6708/2008/12/115

Abstract

We study the charge transport properties of fields confined to a (2+1)-dimensional defect coupled to (3+1)-dimensional super-Yang-Mills at large-$\nc$ and strong coupling, using AdS/CFT techniques applied to linear response theory. The dual system is described by $\nf$ probe D5- or D7-branes in the gravitational background of $\nc$ black D3-branes. Surprisingly, the transport properties of both defect CFT's are essentially identical -- even though the D7-brane construction breaks all supersymmetries. We find that the system possesses a conduction threshold given by the wave-number of the perturbation and that the charge transport arises from a quasiparticle spectrum which is consistent with an intuitive picture where the defect acquires a finite width. We also examine finite- modifications arising from higher derivative interactions in the probe brane action.

54 pages, 22 figures, references added, minor changes to figures and comments, final version published in JHEP

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