Bethe Lecture Series
Introduction to Celestial Holography
March 10 - 14, 2025
Lecturer: Ana-Maria Raclariu (King's College London)
Bethe Center for Theoretical Physics
Bonn, Germany
The Bethe Center for Theoretical Physics at the University of Bonn organizes a small one-week lecture series with the topic Introduction to Celestial Holography.
The schedule includes one morning-lecture on each day of the school and an afternoon-tutorial on Tuesday and Thursday. The Bethe Center cannot provide accommodation or financial support. If you intend to participate in the school please apply via the registration form.
Abstract:
These lectures will review recent developments surrounding the infrared sector of gravity in (3+1)-dimensional asymptotically flat spacetimes (AFS). The first part will focus on the relation between asymptotic symmetry algebras, memory effects and soft theorems. I will show how this relation extends to all orders in a low-energy or asymptotic expansion revealing an infinity of higher-spin charges generating a w-infinity algebra on the gravitational phase space. In the second part I will discuss aspects of 2-dimensional "celestial" conformal field theories proposed to provide a holographic description of gravitational scattering. In particular I will explain the relation between the phase space symmetries above and 2d chiral algebras. Time permitting, I will discuss how many of these features arise in a suitable limit of the AdS/CFT correspondence.
