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Positivity-causality competition: a road to ultimate EFT consistency constraints

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arxiv 2307.04784 v1 pith:QDYI5VIW submitted 2023-07-10 hep-th

Positivity-causality competition: a road to ultimate EFT consistency constraints

classification hep-th
keywords constraintsboundscausalitycomparefieldphotonpositivityunitarity
verification ladder T0 review T1 audit T2 compute T3 formal T4 reserved
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Effective field theories (EFT) are strongly constrained by fundamental principles such as unitarity, locality, causality, and Lorentz invariance. In this paper, we consider the EFT of photons (or other $U(1)$ gauge field) and compare different approaches to obtain bounds on its Wilson coefficients. We present an analytic derivation of the implications of unitarity (linear and non-linear positivity bounds) and compare these constraints with the requirement of causal propagation of the photon modes around non-trivial backgrounds generated by external sources. We find that the low energy causality condition can give complementary constraints to the positivity bounds. Applying both constraints together can significantly reduce the allowed region of the photon EFT parameters.

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Cited by 4 Pith papers

Reviewed papers in the Pith corpus that reference this work. Sorted by Pith novelty score.

  1. Bounds on nonlinear electrodynamics via resummed relative entropy

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    Non-negativity of resummed relative entropy imposes sign constraints on coefficients in nonlinear electrodynamics EFTs and diagnoses instabilities in strong coupling.

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  3. Bounds on nonlinear electrodynamics via resummed relative entropy

    hep-th 2026-06 unverdicted novelty 6.0

    Non-negativity of resummed relative entropy in background EM fields imposes sign constraints on EFT operators and signals physical instabilities such as the Schwinger effect.

  4. IR side of bounds on Theories with Spontaneously Broken Lorentz Symmetry

    hep-th 2024-12 unverdicted novelty 5.0

    The analysis shows that analyticity bounds in Lorentz-broken theories require gapped excitations to propagate slower than gapless ones at low momenta relative to the mass gap.