Double-trace flows and the swampland

Abstract

We explore the idea that large N, non-supersymmetric conformal field theories with a parametrically large gap to higher spin single-trace operators may be obtained as infrared fixed points of relevant double-trace deformations of superconformal field theories. After recalling the AdS interpretation and some potential pathologies of such flows, we introduce a concrete example that appears to avoid them: the ABJM theory at finite k, deformed by ∫ O2, where O is the superconformal primary in the stress-tensor multiplet. We address its relation to recent conjectures based on weak gravity bounds, and discuss the prospects for a wider class of similarly viable flows. Next, we proceed to analyze the spectrum and correlation functions of the putative IR CFT, to leading non-trivial order in 1/N. This includes analytic computations of the change under double-trace flow of connected four-point functions of ABJM superconformal primaries; and of the IR anomalous dimensions of infinite classes of double-trace composite operators. These would be the first analytic results for anomalous dimensions of finite-spin composite operators in any large N CFT3 with an Einstein gravity dual.