Twin Supergravities

TL;DR

This paper explores twin supergravity theories with identical bosonic fields but different fermionic content, classifying them as truncations of more supersymmetric theories and analyzing their gaugings and scalar potentials.

Contribution

It classifies twin supergravities, shows they originate from truncations of a common higher-supersymmetry theory, and analyzes their gaugings and scalar potentials.

Findings

Twin theories can have identical bosonic sectors but different fermionic extensions.

Gaugings and scalar potentials of twin theories are influenced by their bosonic structure and supersymmetry.

Explicit analysis of six-dimensional N=(0,1) and N=(2,1) theories illustrates the concepts.

Abstract

We study the phenomenon that pairs of supergravities can have identical bosonic field content but different fermionic extensions. Such twin theories are classified and shown to originate as truncations of a common theory with more supersymmetry. Moreover, we discuss the possible gaugings and scalar potentials of twin theories. This allows to pinpoint to which extent these structures are determined by the purely bosonic structure of the underlying Kac-Moody algebras and where supersymmetry comes to plays its role. As an example, we analyze the gaugings of the six-dimensional N=(0,1) and N=(2,1) theories with identical bosonic sector and explicitly work out their scalar potentials. The discrepancy between the potentials finds a natural explanation within maximal supergravity, in which both theories may be embedded.