Kavli Affiliate: Austin Joyce
| First 5 Authors: Daniel Baumann, Daniel Baumann, , ,
| Summary:
The representation theory of de Sitter space admits partially massless (PM)
particles, but whether such particles can participate in consistent interacting
theories remains unclear. We investigate the consistency of theories containing
PM fields, particularly when these fields are coupled to gravity. Our strategy
exploits the fact that PM fields correspond to partially conserved currents on
the spacetime boundary, which generate symmetries. These symmetries place
stringent constraints on correlation functions of charged operators, allowing
us to test the consistency of a proposed bulk spectrum. When the assumed
operator content violates these constraints, the corresponding bulk theory is
ruled out. Applying this framework, we show that, in four-dimensional de Sitter
space, PM fields of spin 2 or 3 (at depth 0) cannot couple consistently to
gravity: such couplings necessitate additional massive fields, which are
inevitably non-unitary. In higher dimensions, however, the constraints can be
satisfied without violating unitarity if further PM fields are included. The
resulting structure leads to additional charge conservation laws, which
suggests that consistency may ultimately require an infinite tower of
higher-spin PM fields, akin to the situation for ordinary higher-spin
symmetries. The methods developed here provide powerful constraints on possible
long-range interactions in de Sitter space and delineate the landscape of
consistent quantum field theories in cosmological spacetimes.
| Search Query: ArXiv Query: search_query=au:”Austin Joyce”&id_list=&start=0&max_results=3