Observations on BI from $\mathcal{N}=2$ Supergravity and the General Ward Identity

TL;DR

This paper explores the connection between $ ext{N}=2$ supergravity and rigid supersymmetric theories, revealing how multi-vector Born-Infeld models emerge from supergravity limits and clarifying their symplectic structure and Ward identities.

Contribution

It introduces a new symplectic frame in supergravity that preserves invariance and derives the supergravity origin of features in rigid theories, including the Ward identity and central charge.

Findings

Multi-vector BI models obtained from supergravity limits.

A new symplectic frame preserves invariance in the rigid limit.

Explicit identities for dyonic gaugings in $ ext{N}=2$ models.

Abstract

The multi-vector generalization of a rigid, partially-broken $\mathcal{N}=2$ supersymmetric theory is presented as a rigid limit of a suitable gauged $\mathcal{N}=2$ supergravity with electric, magnetic charges and antisymmetric tensor fields. This on the one hand generalizes a known result by Ferrara, Girardello and Porrati while on the other hand allows to recover the multi-vector BI models from $\mathcal{N}=2$ supergravity as the end-point of a hierarchical limit in which the Planck mass first and then the supersymmetry breaking scale are sent to infinity. We define, in the parent supergravity model, a new symplectic frame in which, in the rigid limit, manifest symplectic invariance is preserved and the electric and magnetic Fayet-Iliopoulos terms are fully originated from the dyonic components of the embedding tensor. The supergravity origin of several features of the resulting rigid supersymmetric theory will be elucidated, such as the presence of a traceless ${\rm SU}(2)$- Lie algebra term in the Ward identity and the existence of a central charge in the supersymmetry algebra which manifests itself as a harmless gauge transformation on the gauge vectors of the rigid theory; we show that this effect can be interpreted as a kind of "superspace non-locality" which does not affect the rigid theory on space-time. To set the stage of our analysis we take the opportunity in this paper to provide and prove the relevant identities of the most general dyonic gauging of Special-Kaehler and Quaternionic-Kaehler isometries in a generic $\mathcal{N}=2$ model, which include the supersymmetry Ward identity, in a fully symplectic-covariant formalism.