Imprint of the black hole singularity on thermal two-point functions

Abstract

We consider two-point functions of light fields at finite temperature and large real frequencies in holographic theories. The thermal system is dual to a single-sided AdS black hole. We show that the high-frequency expansion obtained from the Operator Product Expansion receives exponentially small nonperturbative corrections, which are controlled by null geodesics bouncing off the black hole singularity in the two-sided eternal black hole geometry. We develop a bulk WKB description of these bouncing geodesics and explain how to calculate reflection coefficients at the singularity.

Comments: Longer version. Net changes from v1: minor change in abstract, merged appendices into main text, added Fig. 7 and some explanatory text