Crossing Symmetric Dispersion Relations for Mellin Amplitudes

Abstract: We consider manifestly crossing symmetric dispersion relations for Mellin amplitudes of scalar four point correlators in conformal field theories (CFTs). This allows us to set up the non-perturbative Polyakov bootstrap for CFTs in Mellin space on a firm foundation, thereby fixing the contact term ambiguities in the crossing symmetric blocks. Our new approach employs certain "locality" constraints replacing the requirement of crossing symmetry in the usual fixed-$t$ dispersion relation. Using these constraints we show that the sum rules based on the two channel dispersion relations and the present dispersion relations are identical. Our framework allows us to connect with the conceptually rich picture of the Polyakov blocks being Witten diagrams in anti-de Sitter (AdS) space. We also give two sided bounds for Wilson coefficients for effective field theories in AdS space.