Gravitational quasinormal modes for Lifshitz black branes

Abstract

We study the scalar and vector channels of gravitational quasinormal modes for Lifshitz black branes emerging in Einstein-Maxwell-Dilaton and Einstein-Proca theories in four and five dimensions, finding significant differences between the two models. In particular, rather surprisingly, in the Einstein-Maxwell-Dilaton model the dispersion relations for the shear and sound modes are given by ωshear ∼ −i k4 and ωsound ∼ −i k2, while in the Einstein-Proca model they take the more conventional form ωshear ∼ −i k2 and ωsound ∼ k —the proportionality constants depend on the dynamical exponent and the appropriate factors of temperature. Through the holographic duality, this calculation provides information about the relaxation of the momentum and energy flux operators in a putative dual Lifshitz field theory. Comparing with the dispersion relations obtained directly by considering Lifshitz hydrodynamics suggest that the mass density of the equilibrium state in the Einstein-Maxwell-Dilaton model is infinite.