PIRSA:14090071

Maximal supergravity, holography and the Romans mass

Varela, O. (2014). Maximal supergravity, holography and the Romans mass. Perimeter Institute. https://pirsa.org/14090071

Varela, Oscar. Maximal supergravity, holography and the Romans mass. Perimeter Institute, Sep. 12, 2014, https://pirsa.org/14090071 

          @misc{ pirsa_PIRSA:14090071,
            doi = {10.48660/14090071},
            url = {https://pirsa.org/14090071},
            author = {Varela, Oscar},
            keywords = {Quantum Fields and Strings},
            language = {en},
            title = {Maximal supergravity, holography and the Romans mass},
            publisher = {Perimeter Institute},
            year = {2014},
            month = {sep},
            note = {PIRSA:14090071 see, \url{https://pirsa.org}}
          }

Oscar Varela

Harvard University

Talk number
PIRSA:14090071
Collection
Talk Type
Subject
Abstract
At large N, an important sector of the ABJM field theory defined on a stack of N M2-branes can be described holographically by the D=4 N=8 SO(8)-gauged supergravity of de Wit and Nicolai. Since its inception, the latter has been tacitly assumed to be unique. Recently, however, a one-parameter family of SO(8) gaugings of N=8 supergravity has been discovered, the de Wit-Nicolai theory being just a member in this class. I will explain how this overlooked family of SO(8)-gauged supergravities is deeply related to electric/magnetic duality breaking in four dimensions. I will then discuss some predictions that can be made about the family of dual large-N field theories that these supergravities define, focusing on the structure of superconformal phases and the RG flows between them. I will finally argue that when the gauging is chosen to be related, but different, to the SO(8) one, the D=4 N=8 family arises as consistent truncation of massive IIA on the six-sphere, with the Romans mass identified as the electric/magnetic duality-breaking parameter.