2021/07/12 by Marc Geiller, Puttarak Jai-akson, Geiller, Marc +5
Physics and Astronomy · #Black Holes and Theoretical Physics #Cosmology and Gravitation Theories #FOS: Physical sciences #High Energy Physics - Theory (hep-th) #Noncommutative and Quantum Gravity Theories
paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.2107.05443
openalex publication_date 2021/07/12 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/01
In the context of the infrared triangle there have been recent discussions on the existence and the role of dual charges. We present a new viewpoint on dual magnetic charges in p-form theories, and argue that they can be inherited from the charges of a first order formulation as a topological BF theory with potential. This happens because, depending on the spacetime dimension and on the form degree, the so-called translational gauge symmetries of BF theory become reducible and therefore admit zero-modes. Although such zero-modes lead to trivial symmetries of the p-form theory, they are associated with non-trivial charges. These turn out to be precisely the dual magnetic charges. The centrally-extended current algebra of electric and magnetic charges in the p-form theory then descends naturally from that of BF theory. This is an effort towards finding an existence criterion for dual charges.