Search NASA⌕ Search

Engineering topics

Morrison, David R.

Publications and source records attributed to Morrison, David R..

Charge completeness and the massless charge lattice in F-theory models of supergravity

We prove that, for every 6D supergravity theory that has an F-theory description, the property of charge completeness for the connected component of the gauge group (meaning that all charges in the corresponding charge lattice are realized by massive or massless states in the theory) is equivalent to a standard assumption made in F-theory for how geometry encodes the global gauge theory by means of the Mordell-Weil group of the elliptic fibration. This result also holds in 4D F-theory constructions for the parts of the gauge group that come from sections and from 7-branes. We find that in many 6D F-theory models the full charge lattice of the theory is generated by massless charged states; this occurs for each gauge factor where the associated anomaly coefficient satisfies a simple positivity condition. We describe many of the cases where this massless charge sufficiency condition holds, as well as exceptions where the positivity condition fails, and analyze the related global structure of the gauge group and associated Mordell-Weil torsion in explicit F-theory models.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗

Exotic matter on singular divisors in F-theory

We analyze exotic matter representations that arise on singular seven-brane configurations in F-theory. We develop a general framework for analyzing such representations, and work out explicit descriptions for models with matter in the 2-index and 3-index symmetric representations of SU(N) and SU(2) respectively, associated with double and triple point singularities in the seven-brane locus. These matter representations are associated with Weierstrass models whose discriminants vanish to high order thanks to nontrivial cancellations possible only in the presence of a non-UFD algebraic structure. This structure can be described using the normalization of the ring of intrinsic local functions on a singular divisor. We consider the connection between geometric constraints on singular curves and corresponding constraints on the low-energy spectrum of 6D theories, identifying some new examples of apparent “swampland” theories that cannot be realized in F-theory but have no apparent low-energy inconsistency.

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSIC↗

Tall sections from non-minimal transformations

In previous study, we have shown that elliptic fibrations with two sections, or Mordell-Weil rank one, can always be mapped birationally to a Weierstrass model of a certain form, namely, the Jacobian of a P 112 model. Most constructions of elliptically fibered Calabi-Yau manifolds with two sections have been carried out assuming that the image of this birational map was a “minimal” Weierstrass model. In this paper, we show that for some elliptically fibered Calabi-Yau manifolds with Mordell-Weil rank-one, the Jacobian of the P 112 model is not minimal. Said another way, starting from a Calabi-Yau Weierstrass model, the total space must be blown up (thereby destroying the “Calabi-Yau” property) in order to embed the model into P 112 . In particular, we show that the elliptic fibrations studied recently by Klevers and Taylor fall into this class of models.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗