Towards a description of amorphous solids and viscoelastic materials using effective field theory and holographic methods

Among the most ubiquitous phases of matter, gases and crystalline solids are definitely the simplest to be described. Their physics is indeed almost entirely textbooks material and it can be summarized within the elegant frameworks of kinetic theory and Debye theory. Liquids and specially viscoelastic systems and amorphous materials (e.g. glasses) exhibit a much richer and complex dynamics with provides a large set of fundamental and unresolved physical questions. Given the tremendous microscopic complexity of these systems, which is manifest in a large landscape of scales and anomalous behaviours, the effective field theory (EFT) paradigm of isolating only a few, but fundamental, information could provide a winning approach. This talk is based on the simple, but indeed extremely difficult, question of whether these phases of matter can be distinguished, classified and understood using emergent and/or fundamental symmetry principles as in their ordered crystal counterpart. More precisely, we will combine EFTs, hydrodynamics and holographic methods to tackle the above question. I will present the most recent developments in this direction and I will discuss with you the most important open questions and avenues to explore in the near future.