M5-brane sources, holography, and Argyres-Douglas theories

Abstract We initiate a study of the holographic duals of a class of four-dimensional N $$ \mathcal{N} $$ = 2 superconformal field theories that are engineered by wrapping M5-branes on a sphere with an irregular puncture. These notably include the strongly-coupled field theories of Argyres-Douglas ty...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Ibrahima Bah, Federico Bonetti, Ruben Minasian, Emily Nardoni
Format: article
Language:EN
Published: SpringerOpen 2021
Subjects:
Online Access:https://doaj.org/article/2320023d9b6b4d92bc82f3da622ece4b
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:Abstract We initiate a study of the holographic duals of a class of four-dimensional N $$ \mathcal{N} $$ = 2 superconformal field theories that are engineered by wrapping M5-branes on a sphere with an irregular puncture. These notably include the strongly-coupled field theories of Argyres-Douglas type. Our solutions are obtained in 7d gauged supergravity, where they take the form of a warped product of AdS 5 and a “half-spindle.” The irregular puncture is modeled by a localized M5-brane source in the internal space of the gravity duals. Our solutions feature a realization of supersymmetry that is distinct from the usual topological twist, as well as an interesting Stückelberg mechanism involving the gauge field associated to a generator of the isometry algebra of the internal space. We check the proposed duality by computing the holographic central charge, the flavor symmetry central charge, and the dimensions of various supersymmetric probe M2-branes, and matching these with the dual Argyres-Douglas field theories. Furthermore, we compute the large-N ’t Hooft anomalies of the field theories using anomaly inflow methods in M-theory, and find perfect agreement with the proposed duality.