arXiv research

The study explores highly supersymmetric backgrounds in 11D supergravity.

We study the algebraic structure of the Killing superalgebra of a supersymmetric background of $11$-dimensional supergravity and show that it is isomorphic to a filtered deformation of a $\mathbb Z$-graded subalgebra of the Poincaré superalgebra. We are able to map the classification problem for highly supersymmetric b…

We show that there are no smooth warped AdS$_3$ solutions in 10- and 11-dimensional supergravities which preserve strictly more than 16 supersymmetries and have internal space a compact without boundary manifold.

11D supergravity completes with quantized C-field flux.

New criteria for long-time existence of parabolic flow from 11D supergravity.

We explore all warped $AdS_4\times_w M^{D-4}$ backgrounds with the most general allowed fluxes that preserve more than 16 supersymmetries in $D=10$- and $11$-dimensional supergravities. After imposing the assumption that either the internal space $M^{D-4}$ is compact without boundary or the isometry algebra of the back…

Extends Killing superalgebras to higher dimensions and signatures.

The higher gauge field in 11-dimensional supergravity -- the C-field -- is constrained by quantum effects to be a cocycle in some twisted version of differential cohomology. We argue that it should indeed be a cocycle in a certain twisted nonabelian differential cohomology. We give a simple and natural characterization…

The proper action functional of (4k+3)-dimensional U(1)-Chern-Simons theory including the instanton sectors has a well known description: it is given on the moduli space of fields by the fiber integration of the cup product square of classes in degree-(2k+2) differential cohomology. We first refine this statement from …

We formalize higher dimensional and higher gauge WZW-type sigma-model local prequantum field theory, and discuss its rationalized/perturbative description in (super-)Lie n-algebra homotopy theory (the true home of the "FDA"-language used in the supergravity literature). We show generally how the intersection laws for s…

Starting from the four normed division algebras - the real numbers, complex numbers, quaternions and octonions - a systematic procedure gives a 3-cocycle on the Poincare Lie superalgebra in dimensions 3, 4, 6 and 10. A related procedure gives a 4-cocycle on the Poincare Lie superalgebra in dimensions 4, 5, 7 and 11. In…

In this easy introduction to higher gauge theory, we describe parallel transport for particles and strings in terms of 2-connections on 2-bundles. Just as ordinary gauge theory involves a gauge group, this generalization involves a gauge '2-group'. We focus on 6 examples. First, every abelian Lie group gives a Lie 2-gr…

The paper constructs new supergravity backgrounds using specific geometric constraints.

The presentation of supergravity theories of our previous paper "Super-Poincare' algebras, space-times and supergravities (I)" is re-formulated in the language of Berezin-Leites-Kostant theory of supermanifolds. It is also shown that the equations of Cremmer, Julia and Scherk's theory of 11D-supergravity are equivalent…

A family of new twistor string theories is constructed and shown to be free from world-sheet anomalies. The spectra in space-time are calculated and shown to give Einstein supergravities with second order field equations instead of the higher derivative conformal supergravities that arose from earlier twistor strings. …

A new formulation of theories of supergravity as theories satisfying a generalized Principle of General Covariance is given. It is a generalization of the superspace formulation of simple 4D-supergravity of Wess and Zumino and it is designed to obtain geometric descriptions for the supergravities that correspond to the…

These notes are based on lectures given at the Clay School on Geometry and String Theory, Isaac Newton Institute, Cambridge, 25 March - 19 April 2002. They attempt to provide an elementary and somewhat self contained discussion of the construction of supergravity solutions describing branes wrapping calibrated cycles, …

Local supertwistors help study 6D conformal supergravity.

I will discuss the emergence of lorentzian symmetric spaces as supersymmetric supergravity backgrounds. I will focus on supergravity theories in dimension 11, 10, and 6, and will concentrate on the determination of the so-called maximally supersymmetric backgrounds, for which a classification exists up to local isometr…

We consider bosonic supersymmetric backgrounds of ten-dimensional conformal supergravity. Up to local conformal isometry, we classify the maximally supersymmetric backgrounds, determine their conformal symmetry superalgebras and show how they arise as near-horizon geometries of certain half-BPS backgrounds or as a plan…

Derives log-corrections in AdS4/CFT3 using supergravity localization.

A general approach to formulation of supergravity in higher order anisotropic superspaces (containing as particular cases different supersymmetric extensions and prolongations of Riemann, Finsler, Lagrange and Kaluza--Klein spaces) is given. We analyze three models of locally anisotropic supergravity.

We geometrize six-dimensional pure $\mathcal{N}=1$ Supergravity by means of an exact Courant algebroid, whose Severa class is defined through the Supergravity three-form $H$, equipped with a generalized metric and a compatible, torsion-free, generalized connection. The Supergravity equations of motion follow from the v…

We review the actions of the supergravity theory in eleven dimensions as well as the type IIA and IIB supergravities in ten dimensions and derive the bosonic equations of motion in a coordinate-free notation. We also consider the existence of supersymmetries and the associated generalized Killing spinor equations. The …

We present two different families of eleven-dimensional manifolds that admit non-restricted extensions of the isometry algebras to geometric superalgebras. Both families admit points for which the superalgebra extends to a super Lie algebra; on the one hand, a family of $N=1$, $ν={}^3\!/\!_4$ supergravity backgrounds a…

New decomposable solutions found in 11D supergravity.

Study gauged supergravity, M5-branes, and class R theories, constraining supergravity coefficients and calculating partition functions.

We define a twistor-like transform of the equations of eleven-dimensional supergravity. More precisely these equations are encoded by the CR-structure on the twistor space P^{2*15+11|8*2+16}. In addition equations of the linearized eleven-dimensional supergravity adapted to the 3-form potential can be transformed into …

We present a ten-dimensional theory, named β-supergravity, that contains non-geometric fluxes and could uplift some four-dimensional gauged supergravities. Building on earlier work, we study here its NSNS sector, where Q- and R-fluxes are precisely identified. Interestingly, the Q-flux is captured in an analogue of the…

This work interprets supergravity as a super Cartan geometry linking it to Yang-Mills theory.

We summarize the main results of our recent investigation of bundles of real Clifford modules and briefly touch on some applications to string theory and supergravity.

We summarise the results of our recent paper (arXiv:1511.08737) highlighting what might be considered to be a Lie-algebraic derivation of eleven-dimensional supergravity.

Geometric formulation of 4D supergravity for mathematicians.

This is an expository paper about the geometry of the torsion constraints in the superspace formulation of supergravity theories. It was prepared for the 2001 Park City Research Program in Supergeometry.

Necessary and sufficient conditions are provided for a class of warped product manifolds with non-vanishing flux to be supersymmetric solutions of 11D supergravity. Many noncompact, but complete solutions can be obtained in this manner, including the multi-membrane solution initially found by Duff and Stelle. In a diff…

The paper proves rigidity results for certain supergravity backgrounds in 11 dimensions.

Study the connection between supersymmetry and geometric flows in supergravity.

These notes record three lectures given at the workshop "Higher symmetries in Physics", held at the Universidad Complutense de Madrid in November 2008. In them we explain how to construct a Lie (super)algebra associated to a spin manifold, perhaps with extra geometric data, and a notion of privileged spinors. The typic…

We classify (up to local isometry) the maximally supersymmetric solutions of the eleven- and ten-dimensional supergravity theories. We find that the AdS solutions, the Hpp-waves and the flat space solutions exhaust them.

Ansatze are constructed under which the solutions of 11D supergravity must be stationary points of a parabolic flow on a Riemannian manifold $M^{10-p}$. This parabolic flow turns out to be the Ricci flow coupled to a scalar field, a $(3-p)$-form, and a $4$-form. This allows the introduction of techniques from parabolic…

Holomorphic supergravity theory simplifies anomaly cancellation in heterotic moduli.

A new, simplified form of 10D supergravity action is derived up to all fermion orders.

Novel contact metric structures lead to supergravity solutions.

New contact structures extend supergravity solutions.

We present a geometric construction of the exceptional Lie algebras F4 and E8 starting from the round 8- and 15-spheres, respectively, inspired by the construction of the Killing superalgebra of a supersymmetric supergravity background. (There is no supergravity in the paper.)

We prove that supersymmetry backgrounds of (1,0) and (2,0) six-dimensional supergravity theories preserving more than one half of the supersymmetry are locally homogeneous. As a byproduct we also establish that the Killing spinors of such a background generate a Lie superalgebra.

In this paper we study homogeneous backgrounds of type IIB supergravity where the underlying geometry is that of a symmetric space. We determine which ten-dimensional lorentzian symmetric spaces (up to local isometry) admit such backgrounds and in about two thirds of the cases we determine fully their moduli space.

We study a supersymmetry-preserving solution-generating method in heterotic supergravity. In particular, we use this method to construct one-parameter non-Kahler deformations of Calabi-Yau manifolds with a U(1) isometry, in which the complex structure remains invariant. We explain how to obtain corresponding solutions …