The fluid-gravity correspondence: the membrane at the end of the universe

Abstract

We establish an explicit connection between the evolution of generic inhomogeneous black brane solutions in asymptotically AdS space-times and the evolution of relativistic conformal fluids in one lower dimension. Specifically, given any solution to a particular set of fluid-dynamical equations, one can construct an inhomogeneous black brane solution with a regular event horizon. This connection is reminiscent of the membrane paradigm for black holes; in our case the dynamics of the entire space-time is encoded in a fluid living at the boundary. This fluid-gravity correspondence leads to interesting implications for both gravitational physics and fluid dynamics.