Structure of Anomalies of 4d SCFTs from M5-branes, and Anomaly Inflow

Abstract

We study the 't Hooft anomalies of four-dimensional superconformal field theories that arise from M5-branes wrapped on a punctured Riemann surface. In general there are two independent contributions to the anomalies. There is a bulk term obtained by integrating the anomaly polynomial of the world-volume theory on the M5-branes over the Riemann surface; this contribution knows about the punctures only through its dependence on the Euler characteristic of the surface. The second set of contributions comes from local data at the punctures; these terms are independent from the bulk data of the surface. Using anomaly inflow in M-theory, we describe the general structure of the anomalies for cases when the four-dimensional theories preserve N=2 supersymmetry. We additionally discuss the anomalies corresponding to (p,q) punctures in N=1 theories.

version 2, 38 pages. We simplified the discussion of the inflow procedure with punctures and removed the details of the explicit computation of the puncture anomalies in order to focus on arguing the main new ideas. Added clarification on main result

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• Four-Dimensional SCFTs from M5-Branes
• Tinkertoys for Gaiotto Duality
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• Holography for (1,0) theories in six dimensions
• Six-dimensional D_N theory and four-dimensional SO-USp quivers
• Quiver Tails and N=1 SCFTs from M5-branes
• N=2 S-duality via Outer-automorphism Twists
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• Defect $a$-Theorem and $a$-Maximization
• A slow review of the AGT correspondence
• Anomaly Inflow Methods for SCFT Constructions in Type IIB
• Holographic duals of M5-branes on an irregularly punctured sphere
• Class $\mathcal{S}$ Anomalies from M-theory Inflow
• Wrapped Branes and Punctured Horizons
• Anomaly Inflow, Accidental Symmetry, and Spontaneous Symmetry Breaking
• Holographic Generalised Gukov-Witten Defects
• Comments on chiral algebras and $\Omega$-deformations