Topological holography: The example of the D2-D4 brane system

Abstract

We propose a toy model for holographic duality. The model is constructed by embedding a stack of NN D2-branes and KK D4-branes (with one dimensional intersection) in a 6d topological string theory. The world-volume theory on the D2-branes (resp. D4-branes) is 2d BF theory (resp. 4D Chern-Simons theory) with \mathrm{GL}_NGLN (resp. \mathrm{GL}_KGLK) gauge group. We propose that in the large NN limit the BF theory on \mathbb{R}^2ℝ2 is dual to the closed string theory on \mathbb{R}^2 \times \mathbb{R}_+ \times S^3ℝ2×ℝ+×S3 with the Chern-Simons defect on \mathbb{R} \times \mathbb{R}_+ \times S^2ℝ×ℝ+×S2. As a check for the duality we compute the operator algebra in the BF theory, along the D2-D4 intersection – the algebra is the Yangian of \mathfrak{gl}_K𝔤𝔩K. We then compute the same algebra, in the guise of a scattering algebra, using Witten diagrams in the Chern-Simons theory. Our computations of the algebras are exact (valid at all loops). Finally, we propose a physical string theory construction of this duality using D3-D5 brane configuration in type IIB – using supersymmetric twist and \OmegaΩ-deformation.