Notes on the Causal Structure in a Tensor Network

Abstract

In this paper we attempt to understand Lorentzian tensor networks, as a preparation for constructing tensor networks that can describe more exotic backgrounds such as black holes. To define notions of reference frames and switching of reference frames on a tensor network, we will borrow ideas from the algebraic quantum field theory literature. With these definitions, we construct simple examples of Lorentzian tensor networks and solve the spectrum for a choice of ``inertial frame'' based on Gaussian models of fermions and integrable models. In particular, the tensor network can be viewed as a periodically driven Floquet system, that by-pass the ``doubling problem'' and gives rise to fermions with exactly linear dispersion relations. We will find that a boost operator connecting different inertial frames, and notions of ``Rindler observers'' can be defined, and that important physics in Lorentz invariant QFT, such as the Unruh effect, can be captured by such skeleton of spacetime. We find interesting subtleties when the same approach is directly applied to bosons -- the operator algebra contains commutators that take the wrong sign -- resembling bosons behind horizons.

arXiv commentThe typos are fixed, a shorter version with the new title "Emergent Lorentz symmetry and the Unruh effect in a Lorentzian Fermionic Tensor Network" has been published in PRD

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Cited by in corpus (6)

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• Bulk Locality and Asymptotic Causal Diamonds
• Holographic networks for (1+1)-dimensional de Sitter spacetime
• Tensor networks for quantum causal histories