Renormalization of Critical Gaussian Multiplicative Chaos and KPZ formula

Abstract: Gaussian Multiplicative Chaos is a way to produce a measure on $\R^d$ (or subdomain of $\R^d$) of the form $e^{\gamma X(x)} dx$, where $X$ is a log-correlated Gaussian field and $\gamma \in [0,\sqrt{2d})$ is a fixed constant. A renormalization procedure is needed to make this precise, since $X$ oscillates between $-\infty$ and $\infty$ and is not a function in the usual sense. This procedure yields the zero measure when $\gamma=\sqrt{2d}$. Two methods have been proposed to produce a non-trivial measure when $\gamma=\sqrt{2d}$. The first involves taking a derivative at $\gamma=\sqrt{2d}$ (and was studied in an earlier paper by the current authors), while the second involves a modified renormalization scheme. We show here that the two constructions are equivalent and use this fact to deduce several quantitative properties of the random measure. In particular, we complete the study of the moments of the derivative multiplicative chaos, which allows us to establish the KPZ formula at criticality. The case of two-dimensional (massless or massive) Gaussian free fields is also covered.