Weak Gravity Conjecture from Unitarity and Causality

Abstract

The weak gravity conjecture states that quantum gravity theories have to contain a charged state with a charge-to-mass ratio bigger than unity. By studying unitarity and causality constraints on higher derivative corrections to the charge-to-mass ratio of extremal back holes, we demonstrate that heavy extremal black holes can play the role of the required charged state under several assumptions. In particular, our argument is applicable when the higher spin states Reggeizing graviton exchange are subdominant in the photon scattering. It covers (1) theories with light neutral bosons such as dilaton and moduli, and (2) UV completion where the photon and the graviton are accompanied by different sets of Regge states just like open string theory. Our result provides an existence proof of the weak gravity conjecture in a wide class of theories, including generic string theory setups with the dilaton or other moduli stabilized below the string scale.

7+10 pages, 3 figures; v2: referecnes added, unitarity bounds on entropy corrections included

References in corpus (8)

• Causality, Analyticity and an IR Obstruction to UV Completion
• Tensionless Strings and the Weak Gravity Conjecture
• The Weak Gravity Conjecture in three dimensions
• Infrared Consistency and the Weak Gravity Conjecture
• Positivity of Curvature-Squared Corrections in Gravity
• Constraining Neutrino Masses, the Cosmological Constant and BSM Physics from the Weak Gravity Conjecture
• Topological deformation of isolated horizons
• Weak Gravity Conjecture, Multiple Point Principle and the Standard Model Landscape

Cited by in corpus (114)

• Lectures on the Swampland Program in String Compactifications
• A Stringy Test of the Scalar Weak Gravity Conjecture
• Extremal Effective Field Theories
• The Weak Gravity Conjecture: A Review
• Amplitudes' Positivity, Weak Gravity Conjecture, and Modified Gravity
• Repulsive Forces and the Weak Gravity Conjecture
• Festina Lente: EFT Constraints from Charged Black Hole Evaporation in de Sitter
• Branes and the Swampland
• Causality, Unitarity, and the Weak Gravity Conjecture
• Positivity Bounds and the Massless Spin-2 Pole
• Modular Fluxes, Elliptic Genera, and Weak Gravity Conjectures in Four Dimensions
• A Universal Relation Between Corrections to Entropy and Extremality
• A Holographic Derivation of the Weak Gravity Conjecture
• The Speed of Gravity
• QED positivity bounds
• Rigorous Bounds on Light-by-Light Scattering
• Reverse Bootstrapping: IR lessons for UV physics
• Thermodynamics of 4D Dilatonic Black Holes and the Weak Gravity Conjecture
• Natural Selection Rules: New Positivity Bounds for Massive Spinning Particles
• The FL bound and its phenomenological implications
• Finiteness and the Swampland
• Massless Positivity in Graviton Exchange
• Existence and Instability of Novel Hairy Black Holes in Shift-symmetric Horndeski Theories
• A Strong Scalar Weak Gravity Conjecture and Some Implications
• Bounding Violations of the Weak Gravity Conjecture
• Duality and Axionic Weak Gravity
• Implications of the Weak Gravity Conjecture for Tidal Love Numbers of Black Holes
• Electromagnetic Quasitopological Gravities
• Weak Gravity Conjecture from Conformal Field Theory: A Challenge from Hyperscaling Violating and Kerr-Newman-AdS Black Holes
• Causality Constraints on Black Holes beyond GR
• Unitarity bounds on charged/neutral state mass ratio
• Dynamical Constraints on RG Flows and Cosmology
• Positivity Bounds without Boosts
• Asymptotic Safety: Swampland or Wonderland?
• String gravity in $D=4$
• On the extremality bound of stringy black holes
• Heavy Spinning Particles from Signs of Primordial Non-Gaussianities: Beyond the Positivity Bounds
• Minimal Black Holes and Species Thermodynamics
• Massive Gravity is not Positive
• Emergence of Species Scale Black Hole Horizons
• Is the Standard Model in the Swampland? Consistency Requirements from Gravitational Scattering
• The emergence of universal relations in the AdS black holes thermodynamics
• On the weak gravity conjecture in string theory with broken supersymmetry
• A cautionary case of casual causality
• Putting the Boot into the Swampland
• Duality and Supersymmetry Constraints on the Weak Gravity Conjecture
• Sudden breakdown of effective field theory near cool Kerr-Newman black holes
• Relating the scalar weak gravity conjecture and the swampland distance conjecture for an accelerating universe
• The Black Hole Weak Gravity Conjecture with Multiple Charges
• A universal formula for the density of states in theories with finite-group symmetry
• A New Spin on the Weak Gravity Conjecture
• Weak Gravity Conjecture, Black Hole Entropy, and Modular Invariance
• Duality-invariant extensions of Einstein-Maxwell theory
• $D=5$ Rotating Black Holes in Einstein-Gauss-Bonnet Gravity: Mass and Angular Momentum in Extremality
• WGC and WCC for charged black holes with quintessence and cloud of strings
• Stringy corrections to the entropy of electrically charged supersymmetric black holes with ${\mathrm{AdS}}_5\times S^5$ asymptotics
• Scale and quality of Peccei-Quinn symmetry and weak gravity conjectures
• A NUT Charge Weak Gravity Conjecture from Dimensional Reduction
• Minimal Surfaces and Weak Gravity
• Towards a proof of the Weak Gravity Conjecture
• The Standard Model from String Theory: What Have We Learned?
• The Weak Scale from Weak Gravity
• The shape of Scalar Gauss-Bonnet Gravity
• The Weak Gravity Conjecture Requires the Existence of Exotic AdS Black Holes
• Running Love Numbers and the Effective Field Theory of Gravity
• Higher-derivative holography with a chemical potential
• Finite energy sum rules for gravitational Regge amplitudes
• Axion wormholes with massive dilaton
• Higher derivative corrections to black brane thermodynamics and the weak gravity conjecture
• Corrections to Extremal Black Holes from Iyer-Wald Formalism
• The EFT Bootstrap at Finite $M_{PL}$
• Repulsive Black Holes and Higher-Derivatives
• The Entropy Shift and Extremality Shift at Zero Temperature
• Universal thermodynamic relations with constant corrections for rotating AdS black holes
• From Rotating to Charged Black Holes and Back Again
• Closed Strings and Weak Gravity from Higher-Spin Causality
• On (Scalar QED) Gravitational Positivity Bounds
• Causality and quasi-normal modes in the GREFT
• Swampland Bounds on Dark Sectors
• Positivity bounds in vector theories
• Black Hole Extremality in Nonlinear Electrodynamics: A Lesson for Weak Gravity and Festina Lente Bounds
• Non-Forward UV/IR Relations
• Towards a complete classification of 6D supergravities
• Gravitational Positivity for Phenomenologists: Dark Gauge Boson in the Swampland
• Gravity-Induced Photon Interactions and Infrared Consistency in any Dimensions
• Non-linearly ghost-free higher curvature gravity
• Highly compact Proca stars with quartic self-interactions
• Asymptotic safety, quantum gravity, and the swampland: a conceptual assessment
• Entropy constraints on effective field theory
• Exact electromagnetic duality with nonminimal couplings
• Thermodynamic extremality relations in the massive gravity
• Generalizing weak gravity conjecture
• Universal thermodynamic extremality relations for charged AdS black hole surrounded by quintessence
• Superstring Amplitudes, Unitarity, and Hankel Determinants of Multiple Zeta Values
• Holographic Dual of The Weak Gravity Conjecture
• Lectures in Quantum Gravity
• Hitchhiker's Guide to the Swampland: The Cosmologist's Handbook to the string-theoretical Swampland Programme
• Higher-Derivative Corrections to Entropy and the Weak Gravity Conjecture in Anti-de Sitter Space
• A Weak Gravity Theorem
• Effective field theory in light of relative entropy
• Higher-Derivative Supergravity, AdS${}_4$ Holography, and Black Holes
• Unitarity and unstable-particle scattering amplitudes
• Positivity in Amplitudes and Quantum Entanglement
• EFT Corrections to Charged Black Hole Quasinormal Modes
• Gravitational Positivity Bounds on Scalar Potentials
• De Sitter space constraints on brane tensions and couplings
• Solar System Constraints on Light Propagation from Higher Derivative Corrections to General Relativity and Implications for Fundamental Physics
• ISCOs and the weak gravity conjecture bound in higher derivative theories of gravity
• Holography, Supergravity, and the Weak Gravity Conjecture
• Positivity vs. Lorentz-violation: an explicit example
• The IR-Side of Positivity Bounds
• Extremal Love: tidal/electromagnetic deformability, logarithmic running and the weak gravity conjecture
• Non-supersymmetric black holes with ${\alpha }^{\prime }$ corrections
• Consistency between Bulk and Boundary Causalities in Asymptotically Anti-de Sitter Spacetimes