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arXiv · 1808.01542

Asymptotic symmetries and charges at null infinity: from low to high spins

A. Campoleoni·D. Francia·C. Heissenberg
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Abstract

Weinberg's celebrated factorisation theorem holds for soft quanta of arbitrary integer spin. The same result, for spin one and two, has been rederived assuming that the infinite-dimensional asymptotic symmetry group of Maxwell's equations and of asymptotically flat spaces leave the S-matrix invariant. For higher spins, on the other hand, no such infinite-dimensional asymptotic symmetries were known and, correspondingly, no a priori derivation of Weinberg's theorem could be conjectured. In this contribution we review the identification of higher-spin supertranslations and superrotations in $D=4$ as well as their connection to Weinberg's result. While the procedure we follow can be shown to be consistent in any $D$, no infinite-dimensional enhancement of the asymptotic symmetry group emerges from it in $D>4$, thus leaving a number of questions unanswered.

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A. Campoleoni, D. Francia, C. Heissenberg. 2018-08-04. Asymptotic symmetries and charges at null infinity: from low to high spins. https://arxiv.org/abs/1808.01542

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