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Abstract

Two issues regarding chiral p-forms areaddressed. First, we investigate the topologicalconditions on spacetime under which the action for anonchiral p-form can be split as the sum of the actionsfor two chiral p-forms, one of each chirality. Whenthese conditions are not met, we exhibit explicitly theextra topological degrees of freedom and their couplingsto the chiral modes. Second, we study the problem of constructing Lorentz-invariantself-couplings of a chiral p-form in the light of theDirac-Schwinger condition on the energy-momentum tensorcommutation relations. We show how the Perry-Schwarz condition follows from the Dirac-Schwingercriterion and point out that consistency of thegravitational coupling is automatic.

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Bekaert, X., Henneaux, M. Comments on Chiral p-Forms. International Journal of Theoretical Physics 38, 1161–1172 (1999). https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1026610530708

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