5-brane webs and generalised symmetries

Abstract

5-brane webs provide a powerful geometric description of five-dimensional quantum field theories, encoding data such as symmetries and dualities. Although the extraction of continuous 0-form symmetries from these systems is well understood, their higher-form symmetries have received less attention. We develop a microscopic prescription for determining 1-form symmetries directly from 5-brane webs. BPS Wilson lines are represented by configurations of D3-branes and $(p,q)$ strings, while their screening by local operators is realised through string junctions, Higgsing, and Hanany-Witten transitions. For webs without orientifold planes, this construction reproduces the Smith normal form prescription based on asymptotic 7-brane charges. We extend the analysis to webs containing O7- and O5- planes. For O7$^-$-planes, the resolved 7-brane charges can be incorporated into the Smith normal form, whereas for O7$^+$-planes we propose an effective charge prescription and test it in both Lagrangian and non-Lagrangian examples. For webs with O5-planes, configurations of half-D3-branes reproduce the centre symmetries of Spin gauge theories and their breaking by matter. Crucially, we find that the 1-form symmetry of an O5-plane system is not determined by asymptotic data alone, but can depend on the local structure of the brane configuration near the orientifold.