Sign Flip Triangulations of the Amplituhedron

Abstract

We present new triangulations of the $m=4$ amplituhedron relevant for scattering amplitudes in planar $\mathcal{N}=4$ super-Yang-Mills, obtained directly from the combinatorial definition of the geometry. Using the "sign flip" characterization of the amplituhedron, we reproduce the canonical forms for the all-multiplicity next-to-maximally helicity violating (NMHV) and next-to-next-to-maximally helicity violating (${\text{N}}^2$MHV) tree-level as well as the NMHV one-loop cases, without using any input from traditional amplitudes methods. Our results provide strong evidence for the equivalence of the original definition of the amplituhedron \cite{Arkani-Hamed:2013jha} and the topological one \cite{Arkani-Hamed:2017vfh}, and suggest a new path forward for computing higher loop amplitudes geometrically. In particular, we realize the NMHV one-loop amplituhedron as the intersection of two amplituhedra of lower dimensionality, which is reflected in the novel structure of the corresponding canonical form.

38 pages, 5 figures