Chirality in an $E_8$ model of elementary particles

Abstract

We show how chirality emerges naturally from an embedding of the standard model of particle physics into $E_{8(-24)}$. The well-known argument that there is no chiral theory of fundamental physics in $E_8$ is avoided by implementing chirality not as a property of the complexified Lorentz group, but as a property of the complex representations of the real Lorentz group, combined with a real scalar. This avoids the problems of complexification, and ensures that the model is completely contained in the real Lie group.