Surface charges and dynamical Killing tensors for higher spin gauge fields in constant curvature spaces

TL;DR

This paper explores the relationship between surface charges and divergence-free Killing tensors in higher spin gauge fields within constant curvature spaces, revealing a cohomological approach to compute these charges.

Contribution

It introduces a novel method linking surface charges to cohomology of the BRST model for higher spin fields, extending known concepts from lower spin theories.

Findings

Surface charges correspond to divergence-free Killing tensors.

A cohomological framework is established for computing charges.

The approach generalizes electric and gravitational charges to higher spins.

Abstract

In the context of massless higher spin gauge fields in constant curvature spaces, we compute the surface charges which generalize the electric charge for spin one, the color charges in Yang-Mills theories and the energy-momentum and angular momentum for asymptotically flat gravitational fields. We show that there is a one-to-one map from surface charges onto divergence free Killing tensors. These Killing tensors are computed by relating them to a cohomology group of the first quantized BRST model underlying the Fronsdal action.