Wilson lines with endpoints in 3d CFT

Abstract

In Abelian gauge theories with dynamical matter, Wilson lines can end on the insertions of charged fields. We study the endpoints of Wilson lines in large $N$ bosonic QED$_3$. at its critical point. We first study the stability of an infinite Wilson line in the $\mathbb{CP}^{N-1}$ model by computing the appropriate functional determinant at large $N$. We also compute the conformal dimension of the lowest-dimension endpoint of the line to first order in $N^{-1}$. Along the way we calculate the field-strength tensor $F_{μν}$ in the presence of the line with endpoint and discuss a state-operator correspondence for the endpoints, as well as the existence of an OPE that allows two open-ended Wilson lines to be glued together into a single line.