Journal Article 1 Mention
Conformal anomaly in Weyl theory and anomaly free superconformal theories
Efim S. Fradkin•1984
Arkady A. Tseytlin
Top 6% · 94th Percentile
318 citations · Nuclear and High Energy Physics

TLDR

Quantum effects can disrupt the symmetry of certain gravity theories, but carefully chosen supersymmetric matter can cancel that disruption. The supplied evidence points to a specific combination involving four matter multiplets.

Summary

1 Study Aim

The authors examine the conformal anomaly (a quantum-level failure to preserve scale-and-angle symmetry) in Weyl theory (a gravity framework with that symmetry). They also investigate whether superconformal theories (theories combining supersymmetry with conformal symmetry) can avoid the anomaly. They asked whether quantum effects break the symmetry and whether some related theories can prevent that break.

2 Study Design

This is a theoretical physics study, not an experiment involving people or measurements. The supplied record contains no abstract or full text, but citations describe the authors’ calculations of one-loop quantum effects (the first level of corrections in a standard calculation) and anomaly cancellation in conformal supergravity. A cited account identifies a model coupled to four N=4 super-Yang–Mills (a supersymmetric gauge theory) multiplets. The researchers used mathematical calculations to test whether the symmetry-breaking effects could cancel.

3 Findings

The supplied citation context attributes to Fradkin and Tseytlin the result that N=4 conformal supergravity (a supersymmetric gravity theory with conformal symmetry) can be made free of the conformal anomaly by coupling it to exactly four N=4 super-Yang–Mills multiplets. This points to matter content as a way to cancel the quantum violation. The provided material does not give the paper’s equations, detailed calculation, or other results, so further conclusions cannot be confirmed here. A particular combination of gravity and four matter groups can keep the symmetry from breaking.

Referenced In