Dr David Vegh

David Vegh

Senior Lecturer in Theoretical Physics

School of Physical and Chemical Sciences
Queen Mary University of London

Research

Interests

Our current understanding of Nature is centered around two theories: general relativity which describes classical gravity, and quantum field theory which describes the strong and electroweak interactions and various low-energy phenomena. Naive attempts to unify these two theories lead to insurmountable difficulties. Moreover, a unified theory would ideally explain recent cosmological observations such as the acceleration of the universe, dark matter, and cosmic inflation. Addressing these challenges requires new ideas.

In recent years it has become clear that gravity and quantum physics are not incompatible. On the contrary, they are intimately connected: the emergence of spacetime is thought to be related to the quantum entanglement of degrees of freedom in a “holographic dual” quantum system. However, the nature of this emergence is not fully understood and controlled toy models for emergent gravity would be extremely valuable. The main objective of my current research is to construct such models.

I am also interested in strongly correlated condensed matter systems which have no quasiparticle excitations.

Publications

solid heart iconPublications of specific relevance to the Centre for Fundamental Physics

2024

bullet iconSword L and Vegh D (2024). Quantum mechanical bootstrap on the interval: Obtaining the exact spectrum. Physical Review D, American Physical Society (APS) vol. 109 (12), 126002-126002.  
06-06-2024

2023

Relevant PublicationChapman S, Galante DA, Harris E, Sheorey SU and Vegh D (2023). Complex geodesics in de Sitter space. Journal of High Energy Physics, Springer vol. 2023 (3) 
01-03-2023

2022

Relevant PublicationSword L and Vegh D (2022). What lies beyond the horizon of a holographic p-wave superconductor. Journal of High Energy Physics, Springer Nature vol. 2022 (12), 45-45.  
09-12-2022
Relevant PublicationVegh D and Sword L (2022). Kasner geometries inside holographic superconductors. Journal of High Energy Physics, Scuola Internazionale Superiore di Studi Avanzati (SISSA) vol. 04, 135-135.  
22-04-2022

2021

Relevant PublicationVegh D (2021). Celestial fields on the string and the Schwarzian action. Journal of High Energy Physics, Springer Nature vol. 2021 (7), 50-50.  
09-07-2021
Relevant PublicationČeplak N and Vegh D (2021). Pole skipping and Rarita-Schwinger fields. Physical Review D, American Physical Society vol. 103 (10) 
10-05-2021
Relevant PublicationVegh D (2021). Pair-production of cusps on a string in AdS3. Journal of High Energy Physics, Springer Nature vol. 2021 (3), 218-218.  
23-03-2021

2020

bullet iconČeplak N, Ramdial K and Vegh D (2020). Fermionic pole-skipping in holography. The Journal of High Energy Physics, Springer Verlag (Germany) vol. 2020 (7) 
28-07-2020
bullet iconBlake M, Davison RA and Vegh D (2020). Horizon constraints on holographic Green’s functions. The Journal of High Energy Physics, Springer Verlag (Germany) vol. 2020 (1) 
14-01-2020

2018

bullet iconDe Boer J, Llabrés E, Pedraza JF and Vegh D (2018). Chaotic Strings in AdS/CFT. Physical Review Letters vol. 120 (20) 
18-05-2018
bullet iconVEGH D (2018). Segmented strings coupled to a B-field. Journal of High Energy Physics, Springer Verlag (Germany) 
16-04-2018
bullet iconVEGH D (2018). The broken string in Anti-de Sitter space. Journal of High Energy Physics, Springer 
07-02-2018

2014

bullet iconBlake M, Tong D and Vegh D (2014). Holographic Lattices Give the Graviton an Effective Mass. Physical Review Letters vol. 112 (7) 
01-02-2014

2013

bullet iconFaulkner T, Iqbal N, Liu H, McGreevy J and Vegh D (2013). Charge transport by holographic Fermi surfaces. Physical Review D vol. 88 (4) 
21-08-2013

2011

bullet iconHartnoll SA, Hofman DM and Vegh D (2011). Stellar spectroscopy: Fermions and holographic Lifshitz criticality. Journal of High Energy Physics, Springer Nature vol. 2011 (8) 
01-08-2011
bullet iconFaulkner T, Liu H, McGreevy J and Vegh D (2011). Emergent quantum criticality, Fermi surfaces, and AdS2. Physical Review D, American Physical Society (APS) vol. 83 (12) 
01-06-2011
bullet iconFaulkner T, Iqbal N, Liu H, McGreevy J and Vegh D (2011). Holographic non-Fermi-liquid fixed points. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society A Mathematical Physical and Engineering Sciences, The Royal Society vol. 369 (1941), 1640-1669.  
28-04-2011
bullet iconLiu H, McGreevy J and Vegh D (2011). Non-Fermi liquids from holography. Physical Review D, American Physical Society (APS) vol. 83 (6) 
15-03-2011

2010

bullet iconFaulkner T, Iqbal N, Liu H, McGreevy J and Vegh D (2010). Strange Metal Transport Realized by Gauge/Gravity Duality. Science, American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) vol. 329 (5995), 1043-1047.  
05-08-2010

2009

bullet iconHanany A, Vegh D and Zaffaroni A (2009). Brane tilings and M2 branes. Journal of High Energy Physics, Springer Nature vol. 2009 (03) 
03-03-2009

2008

bullet iconVegh D and McGreevy J (2008). Semi-flatland. Journal of High Energy Physics, Springer Nature vol. 2008 (10) 
16-10-2008

2007

bullet iconButti A, Forcella D, Hanany A, Vegh D and Zaffaroni A (2007). Counting chiral operators in quiver gauge theories. Journal of High Energy Physics, Springer Nature vol. 2007 (11) 
29-11-2007
bullet iconHanany A and Vegh D (2007). Quivers, tilings, branes and rhombi. Journal of High Energy Physics, Springer Nature vol. 2007 (10) 
05-10-2007
bullet iconFranco S, Hanany A, Krefl D, Park J, Uranga AM and Vegh D (2007). Dimers and orientifolds. Journal of High Energy Physics, Springer Nature vol. 2007 (09) 
20-09-2007

2006

bullet iconFranco S and Vegh D (2006). Moduli spaces of gauge theories from Dimer models: proof of the correspondence. Journal of High Energy Physics, Springer Nature vol. 2006 (11) 
22-11-2006
bullet iconHanany A, Herzog CP and Vegh D (2006). Brane tilings and exceptional collections. Journal of High Energy Physics, Springer Nature vol. 2006 (07) 
06-07-2006
bullet iconFranco S, Hanany A, Martelli D, Sparks J, Vegh D and Wecht B (2006). Gauge theories from toric geometry and brane tilings. Journal of High Energy Physics, Springer Nature vol. 2006 (01) 
23-01-2006
bullet iconFranco S, Hanany A, Vegh D, Wecht B and Kennaway KD (2006). Brane dimers and quiver gauge theories. Journal of High Energy Physics, Springer Nature vol. 2006 (01) 
19-01-2006

Grants

solid heart iconGrants of specific relevance to the Centre for Fundamental Physics
solid heart iconAmplitudes, Strings and Duality (CG 2022)
Andreas Brandhuber, David Berman, Matthew Buican, Rodolfo Russo, David Vegh, Sanjaye Ramgoolam, Gabriele Travaglini, Christopher White, Bill Spence, Congkao Wen, Constantinos Papageorgakis, Ricardo Monteiro and Malcolm Perry
£1,477,966 Science & Technology Research Council (STFC) (01-10-2023 - 30-09-2026)
solid heart iconErnest Rutherford Fellowship: From quantum chaos to collective transport in plasmas: Saso Grozdanov
David Vegh
£517,752 Science & Technology Research Council (STFC) (01-10-2020 - 30-09-2025)


solid heart iconAmplitudes, Strings and Duality
Andreas Brandhuber, Bill Spence, Rodolfo Russo, Sanjaye Ramgoolam, Matthew Buican, Michael Green, Steven Thomas, Steven Thomas, Gabriele Travaglini, Congkao Wen, Constantinos Papageorgakis, David Berman, Christopher White, David Vegh, Ricardo Monteiro and Malcolm Perry
£890,210 Science & Technology Research Council (STFC) (01-10-2020 - 31-03-2024)
solid heart iconErnest Rutherford Fellowship
David Vegh
£424,924 Science & Technology Research Council (STFC) (01-10-2017 - 30-09-2023)