We study propagation of a probe particle through a series of closely situated gravitational shocks. We argue that in any UV-complete theory of gravity the result does not depend on the shock ordering — in other words, coincident gravitational shocks commute. Shock commutativity leads to nontrivial constraints on low-energy effective theories. In particular, it excludes non-minimal gravitational couplings unless extra degrees of freedom are judiciously added. In flat space, these constraints are encoded in the vanishing of a certain “superconvergence sum rule.” In AdS, shock commutativity becomes the statement that average null energy (ANEC) operators commute in the dual CFT. We prove commutativity of ANEC operators in any unitary CFT and establish sufficient conditions for commutativity of more general light-ray operators. Superconvergence sum rules on CFT data can be obtained by inserting complete sets of states between light-ray operators. In a planar 4d CFT, these sum rules express $$ \frac{a-c}{c} $$ a − c c in terms of the OPE data of single-trace operators.

We derive a nonperturbative, convergent operator product expansion (OPE) for null-integrated operators on the same null plane in a CFT. The objects appearing in the expansion are light-ray operators, whose matrix elements can be computed by the generalized Lorentzian inversion formula. For example, a product of average null energy (ANEC) operators has an expansion in the light-ray operators that appear in the stress-tensor OPE. An important application is to collider event shapes. The light-ray OPE gives a nonperturbative expansion for event shapes in special functions that we call celestial blocks. As an example, we apply the celestial block expansion to energy-energy correlators in $$ \mathcal{N} $$ N = 4 Super Yang-Mills theory. Using known OPE data, we find perfect agreement with previous results both at weak and strong coupling, and make new predictions at weak coupling through 4 loops (NNNLO).

We initiate an approach to constraining conformal field theory (CFT) data at finite temperature using methods inspired by the conformal bootstrap for vacuum correlation functions. We focus on thermal one-and two-point functions of local operators on the plane. The KMS condition for thermal two-point functions is cast as a crossing equation. By studying the analyticity properties of thermal two-point functions, we derive a "thermal inversion formula" whose output is the set of thermal one-point functions for all operators appearing in a given OPE. This involves identifying a kinematic regime which is the analog of the Regge regime for four-point functions. We demonstrate the effectiveness of the inversion formula by recovering the spectrum and thermal one-point functions in mean field theory, and computing thermal onepoint functions for all higher-spin currents in the critical O(N ) model at leading order in 1/N . Furthermore, we develop a systematic perturbation theory for thermal data in the large spin, low-twist spectrum of any CFT. We explain how the inversion formula and KMS condition may be combined to algorithmically constrain CFTs at finite temperature. Throughout, we draw analogies to the bootstrap for vacuum four-point functions. Finally, we discuss future directions for the thermal conformal bootstrap program, emphasizing applications to various types of CFTs, including those with holographic duals.

We derive a nonperturbative, convergent operator product expansion (OPE) for null-integrated operators on the same null plane in a CFT. The objects appearing in the expansion are light-ray operators with fixed spin and bounded transverse spin, whose matrix elements can be computed by the generalized Lorentzian inversion formula. For example, a product of average null energy (ANEC) operators has an expansion in spin-3 light-ray operators. An important application is to collider event shapes. The light-ray OPE gives a nonperturbative expansion for event shapes in special functions that we call celestial blocks.As an example, we apply the celestial block expansion to energy-energy correlators in N = 4 Super Yang-Mills theory. Using known OPE data, we find perfect agreement with previous results both at weak and strong coupling, and make new predictions at weak coupling through 4 loops (NNNLO).

We study a product of null-integrated local operators O 1 and O 2 on the same null plane in a CFT. Such null-integrated operators transform like primaries in a fictitious d − 2 dimensional CFT in the directions transverse to the null integrals. We give a complete description of the OPE in these transverse directions. The terms with low transverse spin are light-ray operators with spin J 1 + J 2 − 1. The terms with higher transverse spin are primary descendants of light-ray operators with higher spins J 1 + J 2 − 1 + n, constructed using special conformally-invariant differential operators that appear precisely in the kinematics of the light-ray OPE. As an example, the OPE between average null energy operators contains lightray operators with spin 3 (as described by Hofman and Maldacena), but also novel terms with spin 5, 7, 9, etc.. These new terms are important for describing energy two-point correlators in non-rotationally-symmetric states, and for computing multi-point energy correlators. We check our formulas in a non-rotationally-symmetric energy correlator in N = 4 SYM, finding perfect agreement.