Nordita HEP Local Seminars

Scattering on plane waves and the double copy

by Timothy Adamo (Imperial College London)

Europe/Stockholm
132:028 (Nordita East Building)

132:028

Nordita East Building

Roslagstullsbacken 23
Description
The double copy is a method for constructing scattering amplitudes in gravity from scattering amplitudes in gauge theory, perturbatively around Minkowski space. This method has been very useful in the study of perturbative supergravity at high loop orders, and even has a catchy slogan: Gravity = (Gauge theory)^2. However, it is not known if the double copy is an intrinsic feature of gauge theory and gravity as perturbative QFTs or just a (highly effective) trick that happens to work in Minkowski space. In this talk I will describe how the robustness of the double copy can be tested by considering the simplest scattering amplitudes in the simplest non-flat backgrounds; namely, 3-point amplitudes on plane wave backgrounds. Despite various subtleties introduced by the non-trivial scattering background, it is clear that a notion of double copy does indeed exist.