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INT PUB 08-08
Toward an AdS/cold atoms correspondence: a geometric
realization of the Schrodinger symmetry
D. T. Son
Institute for Nuclear Theory, University of Washington,
Seattle, Washington 98195-1550, USA
(Dated: April 2008)
Abstract
We discuss a realization of the nonrelativistic conformal group (the Schr odinger group) as the
symmetry of a spacetime. We write down a toy model in which this geometry is a solution to eld
equations. We discuss various issues related to nonrelativistic holography. In particular, we argue
that free fermions and fermions at unitarity correspond to the same bulk theory with dierent
choices for the near-boundary asymptotics corresponding to the source and the expectation value
of one operator. We describe an extended version of nonrelativistic general coordinate invariance
which is realized holographically.
PACS numbers: 11.25.Tq, 03.75.Ss
1
I. INTRODUCTION
The antide Sitter/conformal eld theory (AdS/CFT) correspondence [1, 2, 3] establishes
the equivalence between a conformal eld theory in at space and a string theory in a higher-
dimensional curved space. The best known example is the equivalence between N = 4
supersymmetric Yang-Mills theory and type IIB string theory in AdS
5
S
5
space. The
strong coupling limit of the eld theory corresponds to the supergravity limit in which the
string theory can be solved. In the recent literature, the N = 4 supersymmetric Yang-Mills
theory at innite t Hooft coupling is frequently used as a prototype to illustrate features of
strongly coupled gauge theories.
There exist, in nonrelativistic physics, another prototype of strong coupling: fermions at
unitarity [4, 5, 6]. This is the system of fermions interacting through a short-ranged potential
which is ne-tuned to support a zero-energy bound state. The system is scale invariant in the
limit of zero-range potential. Since its experimental realizations using trapped cold atoms
at the Feshbach resonance [7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12], this system has attracted enormous interest.
One may wonder if there exists a gravity dual of fermions at unitarity. If such a gravity
dual exists, it would extend the notion of holography to nonrelativistic physics, and could
potentially bring new intuition to this important strongly coupled system. Similarities be-
tween the N = 4 superYang-Mills theory and unitarity fermions indeed exist, the most
important of which is scale invariance. The have been some speculations on the possible
relevance of the universal AdS/CFT value of the viscosity/entropy density ratio [13] for
unitarity fermions [14, 15, 16]. Despite these discussions, no serious attempt to construct a
gravity dual of unitarity fermions has been made to date.
In this paper, we do not claim to have found the gravity dual of the unitary Fermi
gas. However, we take the possible rst step toward such a duality. We will construct
a geometry whose symmetry coincides with the Schrodinger symmetry [17, 18], which is
the symmetry group of fermions at unitarity [19]. In doing so, we keep in mind that one
of the main evidences for gauge/gravity duality is the coincidence between the conformal
symmetry of the N = 4 eld theory and the symmetry of the AdS
5
space. On the basis
of this geometric realization of the Schrodinger symmetry, we will be able to discuss a
nonrelativistic version of the AdS/CFT dictionarythe operator-state correspondence, the
relation between dimensions of operators and masses of elds, etc.
The structure of this paper is as follows. In Sec. II we give a short introduction to
fermions at unitarity, emphasizing the eld-theoretical aspects of the latter. We also review
the Schrodinger algebra. In Sec. III we describe how Schrodinger symmetry can be embedded
into a conformal symmetry in a higher dimension. We consider operator-eld mapping in
Sec. V. In Sec. VI we show how the conservation laws for mass, energy and momentum are
realized holographically. We conclude with Sec. VII.
In this paper d always refers to the number of spatial dimensions in the nonrelativistic
theory, so d = 3 corresponds to the real world.
2
II. REVIEW OF FERMIONS AT UNITARITY AND SCHR

ODINGER SYMME-
TRY
In this section we collect various known facts about fermions at unitarity and the
Schrodinger symmetry. The goal is not to present an exhaustive treatment, but only to
have a minimal amount of materials needed for later discussions. Further details can be
found in [20]. We are mostly interested in vacuum correlation functions (zero temperature
and zero chemical potential), but not in the thermodynamics of the system at nonzero chem-
ical potential. The reasons are twofold: i) the chemical potential breaks the Schrodinger
symmetry and ii) even at zero chemical potential there are nontrivial questions, such as the
spectrum of primary operators (see below). We will comment on how chemical potential
can be taken into account in Sec. VII.
One way to arrive at the theory of unitarity fermions is to start from noninteracting
fermions,
L = i

t

||
2
2m
, (1)
add a source coupled to the dimer eld

[21],
L = i

t

||
2
2m
+

, (2)
and then promote the source to a dynamic eld. There is no kinetic term for in the bare
Lagrangian, but it will be generated by a fermion loop. Depending on the regularization
scheme, one may need to add to (2) a counterterm c
1
0

to cancel the UV divergence in

the one-loop selfenergy (such a term is needed in momentum cuto regularization but not
in dimensional regularization.) The theory dened by the Lagrangian (2) is UV complete
in spatial dimension 2 < d < 4, including the physically most relevant case of d = 3. This
system is called fermions at unitarity, which refers to the fact that the s-wave scattering
cross section between two fermions saturates the unitarity bound.
Another description of fermions at unitarity is in terms of the Lagrangian
L = i

t

||
2
2m
c
0

. (3)
where c
0
is an interaction constant. The interaction is irrelevant in spatial dimensions d > 2,
and is marginal at d = 2. At d = 2+ there is a nontrivial xed point at a nite and negative
value of c
0
of order [22]. The situation is similar to the nonlinear sigma model in 2 +
dimensions.
In the quantum-mechanical language, unitarity fermions are dened as a system with the
free Hamiltonian
H =

i
p
2
i
2m
, (4)
but with a nontrivial Hilbert space, dened to contain those wavefunctions
(x
1
, x
2
, . . . ; y
1
, y
2
, . . .) (where x
i
are coordinates of spin-up particles and y
j
are those of
3
spin-down particles) which satisfy the following boundary conditions when a spin-up and a
spin-down particle approach each other,
(x
1
, x
2
, . . . ; y
1
, y
2
, . . .)
C
|x
i
y
j
|
+ O(|x
i
y
j
|). (5)
where C depends only on coordinates other than x
i
and y
j
. This boundary condition can
be achieved by letting the fermions interact through some pairwise potential (say, a square-
well potential) that has one bound state at threshold. In the limit of zero range of the
potential r
0
0, keeping the zero-energy bound state, the two-body wave function satises
the boundary condition (5) and the physics is universal.
Both free fermions and fermions at unitarity have the Schrodinger symmetrythe sym-
metry group of the Schrodinger equation in free space, which is the nonrelativistic version of
conformal symmetry [19]. The generators of the Schrodinger algebra include temporal trans-
lation H, spatial translations P
i
, rotations M
ij
, Galilean boosts K
i
, dilatation D (where
time and space dilate with dierent factors: t e
2
t, x e

x), one special conformal

transformation C [which takes t t/(1 + t), x x/(1 + t)], and the mass operator M.
The nonzero commutators are
[M
ij
, M
kl
] = i(
ik
M
jl
+
jl
M
ik

il
M
jk

jk
M
il
),
[M
ij
, P
k
] = i(
ik
P
j

jk
P
i
), [M
ij
, K
k
] = i(
ik
K
j

jk
K
i
),
[D, P
i
] = iP
i
, [D, K
i
] = iK
i
, [P
i
, K
j
] = i
ij
M,
[D, H] = 2iH, [D, C] = 2iC, [H, C] = iD.
(6)
The theory of unitarity fermions is also symmetric under an SU(2) group of spin rotations.
The theory of unitarity fermions is an example of nonrelativistic conformal eld theories
(NRCFTs). Many concepts of relativistic CFT, such as scaling dimensions and primary
operators, have counterparts in nonrelativistic CFTs. A local operator O is said to have
scaling dimension if [D, O(0)] = iO(0). Primary operators satisfy [K
i
, O(0)] =
[C, O(0)] = 0. To solve the theory of unitarity fermions at zero temperature and chemical
potential is, in particular, to nd the spectrum of all primary operators.
In the theory of unitarity fermions, there is a quantum-mechanical interpretation of the
dimensions of primary operators [20, 23, 24]. A primary operator with dimension and
charges N

and N

with respect to the spin-up and spin-down particle numbers (the total
particle numbers is N = N

+ N

) corresponds to a solution of the zero-energy Schrodinger

equation:
_

2
x
2
i
+

2
y
2
j
_
(x
1
, x
2
, . . . , x
N

; y
1
, y
2
, . . . , y
N

) = 0, (7)
which satises the boundary condition (5) and with a scaling behavior
(x
1
, x
2
, . . . , y
1
, y
2
, . . .) = R

(
k
), (8)
where R is an overall scale of the relative distances between x
i
, y
j
, and
k
are dimensionless
variables that are dened through the ratios of the relative distances. Equations (7) and (8)
4
dene, for given N

and N

, a discrete set of possible values for . For example, in three

spatial dimensions, for N

= N

= 1, there are two possible values for : 0 and 1. For

N

= 2, N

= 1, the lowest value for is 0.22728. Each value of corresponds to an

operator with dimension , which is related to by
= +
dN
2
. (9)
It has also been established that each primary operator corresponds to a eigenstate of the
Hamiltonian of unitarity fermion in an isotropic harmonic potential of frequency [20, 23,
24]. The scaling dimension of the operator simply coincides with the energy of the state:
E = . (10)
The rst nontrivial operator is the dimer

. It has dimension = d in the free

theory, and = 2 in the theory of fermions at unitarity. This corresponds to the fact that
the lowest energy state of two fermions with opposite spins in a harmonic potential is d
in the case of free fermions and 2 for unitarity fermions.
III. EMBEDDING THE SCHR

ODINGER GROUP INTO A CONFORMAL

GROUP
To realize geometrically the Schrodinger symmetry, we rst embed the Schrodinger group
in d spatial dimensions Sch(d) (d = 3 for the most interesting case of the unitarity Fermi gas)
into the relativistic conformal algebra in d + 2 spacetime dimensions O(d+2, 2). The next
step will be to realize the Schrodinger group as a symmetry of a d+3 dimensional spacetime
background. That the Schrodinger algebra can be embedded into the relativistic conformal
algebra can be seen from the following. Consider the massless Klein-Gordon equation in
((d+1) + 1)-dimensional Minkowski spacetime,

2
t
+
d+1

i=1

2
i
= 0. (11)
This equation is conformally invariant. Dening the light-cone coordinates,
x

=
x
0
x
d+1

2
, (12)
the Klein-Gordon equation becomes
_
2

x

x
+
+
d

i=1

2
i
_
= 0. (13)
If we make an identication /x

= im, then the equation has the form of the Schrodinger

equation in free space, with the light-cone coordinate x
+
playing the role of time,
_
2im

x
+
+
i

i
_
= 0. (14)
5
This equation has the Schrodinger symmetry Sch(d). Since the original Klein-Gordon equa-
tion has conformal symmetry, this means that Sch(d) is a subgroup of O(d+2, 2).
Let us now discuss the embedding explicitly. The conformal algebra is
[

M

,

M

] = i(

),
[

M

,

P

] = i(

),
[

D,

P

] = i

P

, [

D,

K

] = i

K

,
[

P

,

K

] = 2i(

D +

M

),
(15)
where Greek indices run 0, . . . , d+1, and all other commutators are equal to 0. The tilde signs
denote relativistic operators; we reserve untilded symbols for the nonrelativistic generators.
We identify the light-cone momentum

P
+
= (

P
0
+

P
d+1
)/

2 with the mass operator M

in the nonrelativistic theory. We now select all operators in the conformal algebra that
commute with

P
+
. Clearly these operators form a closed algebra, and it is easy to check
that it is the Schrodinger algebra in d spatial dimensions. The identication is as follows:
M =

P
+
, H =

P

, P
i
=

P
i
, M
ij
=

M
ij
,
K
i
=

M
i+
, D =

D +

M
+
, C =

K
+
2
.
(16)
From Eqs. (15) and (16) one nds the commutators between the untilded operators to be
exactly the Schrodinger algebra, Eqs. (6).
IV. GEOMETRIC REALIZATION OF THE SCHR

ODINGER SYMMETRY
To realize the Schrodinger symmetry geometrically, we will take the AdS metric, which
is is invariant under the whole conformal group, and then deform it to reduce the symmetry
down to the Schrodinger group. The AdS space, in Poincare coordinates, is
ds
2
=

dx

dx

+ dz
2
z
2
. (17)
The generators of the conformal group correspond to the following innitesimal coordinates
transformations that leave the metric unchanged,
P

: x

+ a

,
D : x

(1 a)x

, z (1 a)z,
K

: x

+ a

(z
2
+ x x) 2x

(a x)
(18)
(here x x

).
We will now deform the metric so to reduce the symmetry to the Schrodinger group.
In particular, we want the metric to be invariant under D =

D +

M
+
, which is a linear
6
combination of a boost along the x
d+1
direction

M
+
and the scale transformation

D, but
not separately under

M
+
or

D. The following metric satises this condition:
ds
2
=
2(dx
+
)
2
z
4
+
2dx
+
dx

+ dx
i
dx
i
+ dz
2
z
2
. (19)
It is straightforward to verify that the metric (19) exhibits a full Schrodinger symmetry.
From Eqs. (16) and (18) one nds that the generators of the Schrodinger algebra correspond
to the following isometries of the metric:
P
i
: x
i
x
i
+ a
i
, H : x
+
x
+
+ a, M : x

+ a,
K
i
: x
i
x
i
a
i
x
+
, x

a
i
x
i
,
D : x
i
(1 a)x
i
, z (1 a)z, x
+
(1 a)
2
x
+
, x

,
C : z (1 ax
+
)z, x
i
(1 ax
+
)x
i
, x
+
(1 ax
+
)x
+
,
x

a
2
(x
i
x
i
+ z
2
).
(20)
We thus hypothesize that the gravity dual of the unitarity Fermi gas is a theory living
on the background metric (19). Currently we have very little idea of what this theory is.
We shall now discuss several issues related to this proposal.
i) The mass M in the Schrodinger algebra is mapped onto the light-cone momentum P
+

/x

. In nonrelativistic theories the mass spectrum is normally discrete: for example, in

the case of fermions at unitarity the mass of any operator is a multiple of the mass of the
elementary fermion. It is possible that the light-cone coordinate x

is compactied, which
would naturally give rise to the discreteness of the mass spectrum.
ii) In AdS/CFT correspondence the number of color N
c
of the eld theory controls the
magnitude of quantum eects in the string theory side: in the large N
c
limit the string
theory side becomes a classical theory. The usual unitarity Fermi gas does not have this large
parameter N, hence the dual theory probably has unsuppressed quantum eects. However,
there exists an extension of the unitarity Fermi gas with Sp(2N) symmetry [22, 25]. The
gravity dual of this theory may be a classical theory in the limit of large N, although with
an innite number of elds, similar to the conjectured dual of the critical O(N) vector model
in 2+1 dimensions [26].
iii) We can write down a toy model in which the metric (19) is a solution to eld equations.
Consider the theory of gravity coupled to a massive vector eld with a negative cosmological
constant,
S =
_
d
d+2
xdz

g
_
1
2
R
1
4
H

m
2
2
C

_
, (21)
where H

. One can check that Eq. (19), together with

C

= 1, (22)
7
is a solution to the coupled Einstein and Proca equations for the following choice of and
m
2
:
=
1
2
(d + 1)(d + 2), m
2
= 2(d + 2). (23)
iv) Although the g
++
metric component has z
4
singularity at z = 0, the metric has a
plane-wave form and all scalar curvatures are nite. For example, the most singular compo-
nent of the Ricci tensor, R
++
, has a z
4
singularity, as the C
+i+i
and C
+z+z
components of
the Weyl tensor. However, since g
++
= 0, any scalar constructed from the curvature tensor
is regular.
v) In terms of a dual eld theory, the eld A

with mass in Eq. (23) corresponds to a

vector operator O

with dimension , which can be found from the general formula

(1)[ + 1 (d + 2)] = 2(d + 2), (24)
from which = d + 3. We thus can think about the quantum eld theory as an irrelevant
deformation of the original CFT, with the action
S = S
CFT
+ J
_
d
d+2
xO
+
. (25)
V. OPERATOR-FIELD CORRESPONDENCE
Let us now discuss the relationship between the dimension of operators and masses of
elds in this putative nonrelativistic AdS/CFT correspondence. Consider an operator O
dual to a massive scalar eld with mass m
0
. We shall assume that it couples minimally
to gravity,
S =
_
d
d+3
x

g(g

+ m
2
0

). (26)
Assuming the light-cone coordinate x

is periodic, let us concentrate only on the Kaluza-

Klein mode with P
+
= M. The action now becomes
S =
_
d
d+2
xdz
1
z
d+3
_
2iMz
2

t
z
2

i
m
2

_
, (27)
where the nonrelativistic bulk mass m
2
is related to the original mass m
2
0
by m
2
= m
2
0
+
2M
2
. Contributions to m
2
can arise from interaction terms between C

and , for example

|C

|
2
, |C

|
2
, etc. We therefore will treat m
2
as an independent parameter.
The eld equation for is

2
z

d+1
z

z
+
_
2M

k
2

m
2
z
2
_
= 0. (28)
The two independent solutions are

= z
d/2+1
K

(pz), p = (

k
2
2M)
1/2
, =
_
m
2
+
(d+2)
2
4
. (29)
8
As in usual AdS/CFT correspondence, one choice of

corresponds to turning a source

for O in the boundary theory, and another choice corresponds to a condensate of O. One
can distinguish two cases:
1. When 1,
+
is non-normalizable and

is renormalizable. Therefore
+
corre-
sponds to the source and

to the condensate. The correlation function of O is

OO (

k
2
2M)
2
, (30)
which translate into the scaling dimension
=
d+2
2
+ . (31)
2. When 0 < < 1 both asymptotics are normalizable, and there is an ambiguity in the
choice of the source and condensate boundary conditions. These two choices should
correspond to two dierent nonrelativistic CFTs. In one choice the operator O has
dimension = (d +2)/2 +, and in the other choice = (d +2)/2 . It is similar
to the situation discussed in [27].
The smallest dimension of an operator one can get is = (d + 2)/2 when 1.
Therefore, there is a lower bound on operator dimensions,
>
d
2
. (32)
This bound is very natural if one remember that operator dimensions correspond to eigen-
values of the Hamiltonian in an external harmonic potential. For a system of particles in
a harmonic potential, one can separate the center-of-mass motion from the relative motion.
Equation (32) means that the total energy should be larger than the zero-point energy of
the center-of-mass motion.
The fact that there are pairs of nonrelativistic conformal eld theories with two dierent
values of the dimensions of O is a welcome feature of the construction. In fact, free fermions
and fermions at unitarity can be considered as such a pair. In the theory with free fermions
the operator

has dimension d, and for unitarity fermions, this operator has dimension
2. The two numbers are symmetric with respect to (d + 2)/2:
d =
d + 2
2
+
d 2
2
, 2 =
d + 2
2

d 2
2
. (33)
Therefore, free fermions and fermions at unitarity should correspond to the same theory,
but with dierent interpretations for the asymptotics of the eld dual to the operator

.
A similar situation exists in the case of Fermi gas at unitarity with two dierent masses
for spin-up and spin-down fermions [28]. In a certain interval of the mass ratios (between
approximately 8.6 and 13.6), there exist two dierent scale-invariant theories which dier
from each other, in our language, by the dimension of a three-body p-wave operator. At the
upper end of the interval (mass ratio 13.6) the dimension of this operator tends to 5/2 in
both theories; at the lower end it has dimension 3/2 in the theory with three-body resonance
and 7/2 in the theory without three-body resonance.
9
VI. TURNING ON SOURCES
Let us now try to turn on sources coupled to conserved currents in the boundary theory.
That would correspond to turning on non-normalizable modes. For the elds that enter the
model action (21), the general behavior of the non-normalizable part of the metric and the
eld C

near z = 0 is
ds
2
=
2e
2
z
4
(dx
+
B
i
dx
i
)
2

2e

z
2
(dx
+
B
i
dx
i
)(dx

A
0
dx
+
A
i
dx
i
)
+
g
ij
dx
i
dx
j
+ dz
2
z
2
+ O(z
0
),
C

= 1.
(34)
We have chosen the gauge g
z
= 0. The non-normalizable metric uctuations are
parametrized by the functions A
0
, A
i
, , and B
i
of x
+
t and x
i
. These functions are
interpreted as background elds, on which the boundary theory exists. Following the gen-
eral philosophy of AdS/CFT correspondence, we assume that the partition function of the
high-dimensional theory with the boundary condition (34) is equal to the partition function
of an NRCFT in the background elds,
Z = Z[A
0
, A
i
, , B
i
, g
ij
]. (35)
This partition function should be invariant with respect to a group of gauge transformations
acting on the background elds, which we will derive.
The gauge condition g
z
= 0 does not completely x the metric: there is a residual gauge
symmetry parametrized by arbitrary functions of t and x
i
(but not of z):
t t

= t +
t
(t, x), x

= x

(t, x), x
i
x
i
= x
i
+
i
(t, x), (36)
and another set of innitesimal transformations characterized by a function (t, x),
z z

= z (t, x)z, x

= x

+
1
2
g

. (37)
Consider rst (36). Under these residual gauge transformations, the elds entering the
metric (34) change in the following way:
A
0
=

A
0

t
A
i

A
0
,
A
i
=
i

A
0

t
e

g
ij

A
i
A
j

j
,
=

t
B
i

,
B
i
=
i

t
+ B
i
(

t
B
j

j
)

B
i
B
j

j
,
g
ij
= (B
i
g
jk
+ B
j
g
ik
)

g
ij
g
kj

k
g
ik

k
,
(38)
where

t
+
i

i
. The residual gauge symmetry implies that the partition function
of the boundary theory should be invariant under such transformations,
Z = 0. (39)
10
Can one formulate NRCFTs on background elds with this symmetry? In fact, it can be
done explicitly in the theory of free nonrelativistic particles. One introduces the interaction
to the background elds in the following manner:
S =
_
dt dx

g e

_
i
2
e

D
t
D
t

)
g
ij
2m
D
i

D
j

B
i
2m
(D
t

D
i
+ D
i

D
t
)
B
2
2m
D
t

D
t

_
, (40)
where g
ij
is the inverse matrix of g
ij
, g det |g
ij
|, B
i
g
ij
B
i
, B
2
B
i
B
i
, and
D

imA

. One can verify directly that the action (40) is invariant under
the transformations (38), if transforms as
= im

. (41)
In fact, this invariance is an extension of the general coordinate invariance previously dis-
cussed in [29]. The invariance found in [29] corresponds to restricting = B
i
=
t
= 0 in
all formulas.
To linear order in external eld, the action is
S = S[0] +
_
dt dx
_
A
0
+ A
i
j
i
+ + B
i
j
i

+
1
2
h
ij

ij
_
, (42)
and from Eq. (40) one reads out the physical meaning of the operators coupled to the
external sources:
h
ij
is coupled to the stress tensor
ij
,
A

is coupled to the mass current (, j),

(, B
i
) are coupled to the energy current (, j

).
The invariance of the partition function with respect to the gauge transformations (38) leads
to an innite set of Takahashi-Ward identities for the correlation functions. The simplest
ones are for the one-point functions. The fact that the group of invariance includes gauge
transformation of A

: A

guarantees the conservation of mass. The fact that

the linear parts in the transformation laws for and B
i
look like a gauge transformation,
=

t
+ and B
i
=
i

t
+ leads to energy conservation in the absence of external
elds:

t
_
ln Z

_
+
i
_
ln Z
B
i
_

A==B
i
=h
ij
=0
= 0. (43)
Energy is not conserved in a general background (which is natural, since the background
elds exert external forces on the system). Similarly, momentum conservation
t
j
i
+
j

ij
=
0 (and the fact that momentum density coincides with mass current) is related to terms linear
in
i
in A
i
and g
ij
: A
i
=

i
+ , g
ij
=
i

i
+ .
11
Let us now turn to the transformations (37), under which
= 2, g
ij
= 2g
ij
. (44)
The invariance of the partition function with respect to this transformation implies
2 =
i
i
, (45)
which is the familiar relationship between energy and pressure,
E =
d
2
PV, (46)
valid for free gas as well as for Fermi gas at unitarity. The action (40) is not invariant
under (44), but it can be made so by replacing the minimal coupling by a conformal cou-
pling to external elds. Therefore, the proposed holography is consistent with conservation
laws and the universal thermodynamic relation between energy and pressure.
VII. CONCLUSION
The main goal of the paper is to construct a geometry with the symmetry of the
Schrodinger group. The existence of such a geometrical realization make it possible to
discuss the possibility of a dual description of Fermi gas at unitarity at a concrete level.
It remains to be seen if holography is a notion as useful in nonrelativistic physics as it is
for relativistic quantum eld theories. At the very least, one should expect holography to
provide toy models with Schrodinger symmetry.
In this paper we have considered only the properties of the vacuum correlation functions.
In order to construct the gravity dual of the nite-density ground state, about which a lot
is known both experimentally and theoretically, one should turns on a background A
0
in
the metric (34). Superuidity of the system should be encoded in the condensation of the
scalar eld

(whose dimension is 2 in the case of unitarity fermions, cf. [30, 31]). It

would be interesting to nd black-hole metrics which realize nonrelativistic hydrodynamics
and superuid hydrodynamics. We defer this problem to future work.
Acknowledgments
The author thanks A. Karch and Y. Nishida for discussions leading to this work, and
S. Hartnoll, V. Hubeny, D. Mateos, H. Liu, K. Rajagopal, M. Rangamani, S. Shenker, and
M. Stephanov for valuable comments. This work is supported, in part, by DOE Grant
DE-FG02-00ER41132.
Note addedAfter this work was completed, J. McGreevy informed the author that he
and K. Balasubramanian have also obtained the metric (19) and determined that it has
12
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