Anomaly inflow and gauge group topology in the 10d Sugimoto string theory

• Published in: The journal of high energy physics Vol. 2025; no. 6; pp. 136 - 30
• Main Authors: Larotonda, Vittorio, Lin, Ling
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Berlin/Heidelberg Springer Berlin Heidelberg 13.06.2025; Springer Nature B.V; SpringerOpen
• Subjects: Anomalies in Field and String Theories; Branes; Classical and Quantum Gravitation; D-Branes; Elementary Particles; Fermions; Gauge theory; Inflow; Physics; Physics and Astronomy; Quantum Field Theories; Quantum Field Theory; Quantum Physics; Regular Article - Theoretical Physics; Relativity Theory; Spacetime; String Theory; Supersymmetry; Topology; D-Branes; Anomalies in Field and String Theories
• ISSN: 1029-8479; 1029-8479
• DOI: 10.1007/JHEP06(2025)136

A bstract We revisit the chiral spectra on charged 1- and 5-branes in the 10d non-supersymmetric sp 16 string theory (also known as the Sugimoto model), and verify that they consistently cancel the anomaly inflow induced by a Green-Schwarz mechanism in the bulk. By analyzing the sp 16 representations arising from quantizing the fermion zero modes on these branes as well as uncharged 4-branes, we find compelling evidence that the global structure of the gauge group is Sp(16)/ ℤ 2 . We further comment on a possible duality to non-supersymmetric heterotic strings, and explore bottom-up anomaly inflow constraints for 10d effective Sp(16)/ ℤ 2 gauge theories coupled to gravity.