Hidden Borcherds symmetries in Z_n orbifolds of M-theory and magnetized D-branes in type 0' orientifolds

Abstract

We study T^{11-D-q}xT^q/Z_n orbifold compactifications of 11D supergravity and M-theory by a purely algebraic method. Using the mapping between scalar fields of toroidally compactified maximal supergravity and generators of the U-duality symmetry, we express the orbifold action as a finite order inner automorphism and compute the residual real U-duality algebra surviving the orbifold projection for all dimensions D=1,...,10-q. In D=1, these invariant subalgebras are shown to be described by Borcherds and Kac-Moody algebras with a degenerate Cartan matrix, modded out by their centres and derivations. We further construct an alternative description of the orbifold action in terms of equivalence classes of shift vectors, finding that a root of e_{10} can always be chosen as the class representative in D=1. In the case of Z_2 orbifolds of M-theory descending to type 0' orientifolds, we argue that these roots can be interpreted as pairs of magnetized D9- and D9'-branes ensuring tadpole cancellation. More generally, we provide a classification of all such roots generating Z_n product orbifolds for n<7.