Kurt Hinterbichler, Shift Symmetries, Equivalence of EFTs and Time-Like Extra Dimensions

ITMP seminar, Feb 7, 2024
Speaker: Prof. Kurt Hinterbichler, Case Western Reserve University
Title: Shift Symmetries, Equivalence of EFTs and Time-Like Extra Dimensions
Abstract: Poincare invariant effective field theories can have extended shift symmetries that indicate the spontaneous breaking of higher dimensional spacetime symmetries. Such theories are often the result of geometric actions describing the worldvolume dynamics of branes fluctuating in higher dimensions. I will review how these symmetries are classified and how the dynamics of the effective theories are expected to be determined solely by their degrees of freedom and symmetry breaking patterns. I will describe an example where a brane probing a spacelike extra dimension is equivalent to one probing a timelike extra dimension.