Origin of Logarithmic Operators in Conformal Field Theories

Abstract

We study logarithmic operators in Coulomb gas models, and show that they occur when the ``puncture'' operator of the Liouville theory is included in the model. We also consider WZNW models for $SL(2,R)$, and for SU(2) at level 0, in which we find logarithmic operators which form Jordan blocks for the current as well as the Virasoro algebra.