arXiv subjects

Arun Debray

Publications and source records attributed to Arun Debray.

27 records · Page 2Linked to original sources

arXiv2023

Bordism for the 2-group symmetries of the heterotic and CHL strings

In the presence of a nonzero B-field, the symmetries of the $\mathrm E_8\times \mathrm E_8$ heterotic string form a 2-group, or a categorified group, as do the symmetries of the CHL string. We express the bordism groups of the corresponding tangential structures as twisted string bordism groups, then compute them through dimension 11 modulo a few unresolved ambiguities. Then, we use these bordism groups to study anomalies and defects for these two string theories.

math.AT↗

arXiv2023

The Chronicles of IIBordia: Dualities, Bordisms, and the Swampland

In this work we investigate the Swampland Cobordism Conjecture in the context of type IIB string theory geometries with non-trivial duality bundle. Quite remarkably, we find that many non-trivial bordism classes with duality bundles in Mp$(2,\mathbb{Z})$, a double cover of SL$(2,\mathbb{Z})$ related to fermions, correspond to asymptotic boundaries of well-known supersymmetric F-theory backgrounds. These include $[p,q]$-7-branes, non-Higgsable clusters, S-folds, as well as various lower-dimensional generalizations. These string theoretic objects break the global symmetries associated to the non-trivial bordism groups, providing a strong test of the Cobordism Conjecture. Further including worldsheet orientation reversal promotes the duality group to the Pin$^+$ cover of GL$(2,\mathbb{Z})$. The corresponding bordism groups require a new non-supersymmetric "reflection 7-brane" and its compactifications to ensure the absence of global symmetries, thus providing an interesting prediction of the Cobordism Conjecture for non-supersymmetric type IIB backgrounds. A major component of the present work is the explicit derivation of the involved bordism groups as well as their generators, which correspond to asymptotic boundaries of explicit string theory backgrounds. The main tool is the Adams spectral sequence, to which we provide a detailed introduction. We anticipate that the same techniques can be applied in a wide variety of settings.

hep-th↗

arXiv2023

Differential Cohomology: Categories, Characteristic Classes, and Connections

We give an overview of differential cohomology from a modern, homotopy-theoretic perspective in terms of sheaves on manifolds. Although modern techniques are used, we base our discussion in the classical precursors to this modern approach, such as Chern-Weil theory and differential characters, and include the necessary background to increase accessibility. Special treatment is given to differential characteristic classes, including a differential lift of the first Pontryagin class. Multiple applications, including to configuration spaces, invertible field theories, and conformal immersions, are also discussed. This book is based on talks given at MIT's Juvitop seminar jointly with UT Austin in the Fall of 2019.

math.AT↗

arXiv2021

Constructing the Virasoro groups using differential cohomology

The Virasoro groups are a family of central extensions of $\mathrm{Diff}^+(S^1)$, the group of orientation-preserving diffeomorphisms of $S^1$, by the circle group $\mathbb T$. We give a novel, geometric construction of these central extensions using "off-diagonal" differential lifts of the first Pontryagin class, thus affirmatively answering a question of Freed-Hopkins.

math.AT↗

arXiv2021

The anomaly that was not meant IIB

Type IIB supergravity enjoys a discrete non-Abelian duality group, which has potential quantum anomalies. In this paper we explicitly compute these, and present the bordism group that controls them, modulo some physically motivated assumptions. Quite surprisingly, we find that they do not vanish, which naively would signal an inconsistency of F-theory. Remarkably, a subtle modification of the standard 10d Chern-Simons term cancels these anomalies, a fact which relies on the ***specific*** field content of type IIB supergravity. We also discover other ways to cancel this anomaly, via a topological analog of the Green-Schwarz mechanism. These alternative type IIB theories have the same low energy supergravity limit as ordinary type IIB, but a different spectrum of extended objects. They could either be part of the Swampland, or connect to the standard theory via domain walls.

hep-th↗

arXiv2021

Stable diffeomorphism classification of some unorientable 4-manifolds

Kreck's modified surgery theory reduces the classification of closed, connected 4-manifolds, up to connect sum with some number of copies of $S^2\times S^2$, to a series of bordism questions. We implement this in the case of unorientable 4-manifolds M and show that for some choices of fundamental groups, the computations simplify considerably. We use this to solve some cases in which $π_1(M)$ is finite of order 2 mod 4: under an assumption on cohomology, there are nine stable diffeomorphism classes for which M is pin$^+$, one stable diffeomorphism class for which M is pin$^-$, and four stable diffeomorphism classes for which M is neither. We also determine the corresponding stable homeomorphism classes.

math.GT↗

arXiv2019

Advanced topics in gauge theory: mathematics and physics of Higgs bundles

These notes have been prepared as reading material for the mini-course given by the author at the "2019 Graduate Summer School" at Park City Mathematics Institute - Institute for Advanced Study. We begin by introducing Higgs bundles and their main properties (Lecture 1), and then we discuss the Hitchin fibration and its different uses (Lecture 2). The second half of the course is dedicated to studying different types of subspaces (branes) of the moduli space of complex Higgs bundles, their appearances in terms of flat connections and representations (Lecture 3), as well as correspondences between them (Lecture 4).

math-ph↗

arXiv2018

The low-energy TQFT of the generalized double semion model

The generalized double semion (GDS) model, introduced by Freedman and Hastings, is a lattice system similar to the toric code, with a gapped Hamiltonian whose definition depends on a triangulation of the ambient manifold $M$, but whose space of ground states does not depend on the triangulation, but only on the underlying manifold. In this paper, we use topological quantum field theory (TQFT) to investigate the low-energy limit of the GDS model. We define and study a functorial TQFT $Z_{\mathrm{GDS}}$ in every dimension $n$ such that for every closed $(n - 1)$-manifold $M$, $Z_{\mathrm{GDS}}(M)$ is isomorphic to the space of ground states of the GDS model on $M$; the isomorphism can be chosen to intertwine the actions of the mapping class group of $M$ that arise on both sides. Throughout this paper, we compare our constructions and results with their known analogues for the toric code.

math-ph↗

arXiv2018

The Arf-Brown TQFT of Pin$^-$ Surfaces

The Arf-Brown invariant $\mathit{AB}(Σ)$ is an 8th root of unity associated to a surface $Σ$ equipped with a pin$^-$ structure. In this note we investigate a certain fully extended, invertible, topological quantum field theory (TQFT) whose partition function is the Arf-Brown invariant. Our motivation comes from the recent work of Freed-Hopkins on the classification of topological phases, of which the Arf-Brown TQFT provides a nice example of the general theory; physically, it can be thought of as the low energy effective theory of the Majorana chain, or as the anomaly theory of a free fermion in 1 dimension.

math-ph↗