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Counter-examples to the correlated stability conjecture

Joshua J. Friess, Steven S. Gubser, Indrajit Mitra

hep-tharXiv:hep-th/0508220

Abstract

We demonstrate explicit counter-examples to the Correlated Stability Conjecture (CSC), which claims that the horizon of a black brane is unstable precisely if that horizon has a thermodynamic instability, meaning that its matrix of susceptibilities has a negative eigenvalue. These examples involve phase transitions near the horizon. Ways to restrict or revise the CSC are suggested. One of our examples shows that N=1* gauge theory has a second order chiral symmetry breaking phase transition at a temperature well above the confinement scale.

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