Safe Gauge-String Correspondence

Abstract: Safe theories are quantum field theories whose continuum limit is defined by a non-Gaussian ultraviolet fixed point when the ultraviolet cutoff is removed. They constitute an important set in the space of quantum field theories. Here we develop the safe' gauge-string correspondence program according to which $d$-dimensional safe gauge theories, admitting thet Hooft-Veneziano limit, are holographically dual to $(d+1)$-dimensional safe noncritical string theories on asymptotically anti-de Sitter space. We provide evidences for this correspondence on a class of safe templates that engage fermion and scalar matter fields into gauge, Yukawa and Higgs self-interactions. Safe theories can feature in the infrared both a weak coupling phase and a strong coupling phase on either side of the ultraviolet fixed point. They correspond respectively to dilaton and warp factors taking domain-wall or Liouville-wall profiles on asymptotically anti-de Sitter space. We argue that four-dimensional ${\cal N}=4$ super Yang-Mills theories and all known interacting (super)conformal field theories are nonperturbative limit situations of safe gauge theories. The weak coupling phase provides a solvable holographic renormalization group flow while the strong coupling infrared phase provides a runaway-free alternative to holographic QCD.