Holographic Renormalization of String-Derived Lovelock--Horndeski Theory

Abstract

String-derived higher-curvature scalar--tensor gravities encode microscopic coupling data in boundary response, raising the question of whether holographic observables can reconstruct the underlying higher-dimensional parameters. We answer this question for the five-dimensional string-derived Lovelock--Horndeski (SDLH) theory on its exact linear-dilaton asymptotically locally AdS branch, constructing the renormalized generating functional for an arbitrary boundary metric and spacetime-dependent scalar source. A boundary-covariant radial hierarchy unifies the variational problem, local backreaction, logarithmic obstruction, finite one-point functions, and Ward identities. Two response determinants organize the recursion, resonant obstructions, and metric--scalar mixing. The Weyl anomaly condenses into an Euler density, a Weyl-squared density, and a single curvature--scalar square whose paired variations generate the metric and scalar obstructions. The resulting renormalized functional carries string-selected coupling data into boundary geometry, operator response, anomaly coefficients, and a calculable interface with gravitational observables. On the regular branch, four scalar-normalization-invariant holographic combinations admit a global rational inverse to the continuous reduced couplings. At fixed compactification dimension the map has maximal rank, while the curvature-anomaly sum reconstructs the higher-dimensional Gauss--Bonnet coefficient without sign ambiguity. Holographic response thus provides an explicit, overdetermined boundary fingerprint of the underlying string reduction.