Light-Front Holography: A First Approximation to QCD

Starting from the Hamiltonian equation of motion in QCD, we identify an invariant light-front coordinate $zeta$ which allows the separation of the dynamics of quark and gluon binding from the kinematics of constituent spin and internal orbital angular momentum. The result is a single variable light-front Schrodinger equation for QCD which determines the eigenspectrum and the light-front wavefunctions of hadrons for general spin and orbital angular momentum. This light-front wave equation is equivalent to the equations of motion which describe the propagation of spin-$J$ modes on anti-de Sitter (AdS) space.

Light-Front Holography and Novel Effects in QCD

The correspondence between theories in anti-de Sitter space and conformal field theories in physical space-time leads to an analytic, semiclassical model for strongly-coupled QCD. Light-front holography allows hadronic amplitudes in the AdS fifth dimension to be mapped to frame-independent light-front wavefunctions of hadrons in physical space-time, thus providing a relativistic description of hadrons at the amplitude level. We identify the AdS coordinate $z$ with an invariant light-front coordinate $zeta$ which separates the dynamics of quark and gluon binding from the kinematics of constituent spin and internal orbital angular momentum. The result is a single-variable light-front Schrodinger equation for QCD which determines the eigenspectrum and the light-front wavefunctions of hadrons for general spin and orbital angular momentum. The mapping of electromagnetic and gravitational form factors in AdS space to their corresponding expressions in light-front theory confirms this correspondence. Some novel features of QCD are discussed, including the consequences of confinement for quark and gluon condensates and the behavior of the QCD coupling in the infrared. The distinction between static structure functions such as the probability distributions computed from the square of the light-front wavefunctions versus dynamical structure functions which include the effects of rescattering is emphasized. A new method for computing the hadronization of quark and gluon jets at the amplitude level, an event amplitude generator, is outlined.

AdS/QCD and its Holographic Light-Front Partonic Representation

Starting from the Hamiltonian equation of motion in QCD we find a single variable light-front equation for QCD which determines the eigenspectrum and the light-front wavefunctions of hadrons for general spin and orbital angular momentum. This light-front wave equation is equivalent to the equations of motion which describe the propagation of spin-$J$ modes on anti-de Sitter (AdS) space.

The AdS/CFT Correspondence and Light-Front QCD

We identify an invariant light-front coordinate $zeta$ which allows the separation of the dynamics of quark and gluon binding from the kinematics of constituent spin and internal orbital angular momentum. The result is a single-variable light-front Schrodinger equation for QCD which determines the eigenspectrum and the light-front wavefunctions of hadrons for general spin and orbital angular momentum. This frame-independent light-front wave equation is equivalent to the equations of motion which describe the propagation of spin-$J$ modes on anti-de Sitter (AdS) space. Light-front holography is a remarkable feature of AdS/CFT: it allows hadronic amplitudes in the AdS fifth dimension to be mapped to frame-independent light-front wavefunctions of hadrons in physical space-time, thus providing a relativistic description of hadrons at the amplitude level. In principle, the model can be systematically improved by diagonalizing the full QCD light-front Hamiltonian on the AdS/QCD basis. Quark and gluon hadronization can be computed at the amplitude level by convoluting the off-shell $T$ matrix calculated from the QCD light-front Hamiltonian with the hadronic light-front wavefunctions. We also note the distinction between static observables such as the probability distributions computed from the square of the light-front wavefunctions versus dynamical observables such as the structure functions and the leading-twist single-spin asymmetries measured in deep inelastic scattering which include the effects of initial and final-state interactions.