Chetan begins by reviewing the eikonal approximation, and factorization theorems for amplitudes. Amartya then discusses this in context of quantum gravity, causality constraints and regge behaviour. This brings us to Vasiliev gravity the origin
Santhosh begins this episode with a discussion about transverse field Ising chains and dualities, anyon algebras, and systems with known spectra but unknown states. Amartya then talks about the relation between the emergence proposal in EFTs an
We reunite in person after nearly 2 years. Chetan begins this episode with a discussion about Witten's recent work on the deep connection between gauge-gravity amplitudes and geometry in twistor space, and how this suggests a more fundamental l
In this episode, we begin by reviewing the weak gravity conjecture. We then discuss such "swampland conjectures" from the EFT perspective- in the form of positivity bounds, and discuss in detail the UV completion of dimension 6 operators. We th
In this episode, we discuss aspects of hermiticity and unitarity, in the context of PT-symmetric Hamiltonians. Then, we take a detour towards discussing the fascinating story of neutrinos in the standard model, the big problem of neutrino masse
In this episode, we discuss what has our experience doing physics been so far-how it's different from what we thought it'd be, what lies ahead. We express (some very strongly) our thoughts about the general nature of the academic institution, w
In this episode, our friend and today's guest on the podcast, Rohan Maniar, talks about his area of research- 2D magnetic systems. We discuss long-range order in 2D systems and the Mermin-Wagner theorem. We then ramble about stochastic thermody
We start by briefly discussing axions and inflation. Amartya then rambles about the structure of vacua in compactified theories. Chetan discusses an interesting relationship between moduli stabilization and compactification. We then finally mov
In this episode, we discuss ideas of integrability in physics, ranging from classical mechanics to classical and quantum field theories. Amartya discusses some ideas about positivity bounds and the swampland, and with a brief existential discus
In this episode, Santhosh describes some features of 1D interacting systems, exploring Bethe ansatz, parafermions, dualities, etc. and Amartya rambles about unitarity bounds, 'ghosts', etc; distinguishing 'healthy' field theories from those in
In this episode, Amartya rambles about an interesting idea of studying inflationary correlators, and we discuss the unreasonable effectiveness of physics in math.
In this episode, we talk about an idea central to both condensed matter and particle physics-spontaneous symmetry breaking. Starting from the instructive example of a ferromagnet, we move to the famous Higgs mechanism in the context of gauge th
In this episode, we discuss the idea of time in physics, inspired by the concept in the movie, Arrival. We ramble about general covariance in relativity, choosing space-like hypersurfaces in cosmology, the metric signature and how despite its s
In this episode, we discuss the interesting ideas of spontaneous compactification of higher dimensions in theories like string theory, the Kaluza-Klein picture, etc. We then ramble about aspects of bulk-boundary correspondence and topological i
In this episode, we discuss the million dollar question- how did the universe begin? Why does it expand? How does large scale structure form? Listen to us ramble about the big bang, inflationary cosmology, dark matter, and other fascinating ide
In this episode, we discuss various ideas to understand what "temperature" is. Usually a statistical parameter describing equilibrium systems, we try to look for a more general description, which leads to a discussion of black holes and quantum
In this episode, we (Chetan, Amartya, and Santhosh) discuss some random ideas about quantum field theories, which range from hidden structures/symmetries, RG flows, anomalies to ideas about condensed matter physics.