Large $N$ analytical functional bootstrap I: 1D CFTs and total positivity

Abstract

We initiate the analytical functional bootstrap study of conformal field theories with large $N$ limits. In this first paper we particularly focus on the 1D $O(N)$ vector bootstrap. We obtain a remarkably simple bootstrap equation from the $O(N)$ vector crossing equations in the large $N$ limit. The bootstrap bound is saturated by the generalized free field theory. We study the analytical extremal functionals of this crossing equation, for which the total positivity of the $SL(2,\mathbb{R})$ conformal block plays a critical role. We prove the $SL(2,\mathbb{R})$ conformal block is totally positive for large scaling dimension $\Delta$ and show that the total positivity is violated below a critical value ${\Delta }_{\text{TP}}^{\ast }\approx 0.32315626$. The conformal block forms a surprisingly sophisticated mathematical structure, which for instance can violate total positivity at the order $10^{-5654}$ for a normal value $\Delta =0.1627$! We construct a series of analytical functionals $\{{\alpha }_M\}$ which satisfy the bootstrap positive conditions up to a range $\Delta ⩽{\Lambda }_M$. The functionals $\{{\alpha }_M\}$ have a trivial large $M$ limit. Surprisingly, due to total positivity, they can approach the large $M$ limit in a way consistent with the bootstrap positive conditions for arbitrarily high ${\Lambda }_M$, therefore proving the bootstrap bound analytically. Our result provides a concrete example to illustrate how the analytical properties of the conformal block lead to nontrivial bootstrap bounds. We expect this work paves the way for large $N$ analytical functional bootstrap in higher dimensions.

v1: 48 pages, 9 figures; v2: refs added, typos corrected, added an estimation of the critical value for total positivity

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• Bootstrap Method in Theoretical Physics