English

Building blocks for $W$-algebras of classical types

Representation Theory 2025-11-14 v3 High Energy Physics - Theory Quantum Algebra

Abstract

The universal 22-parameter vertex algebra WW_{\infty} of type W(2,3,4,)W(2,3,4,\dots) serves as a classifying object for vertex algebras of type W(2,3,,N)W(2,3,\dots,N) for some NN in the sense that under mild hypothesis, all such vertex algebras arise as quotients of WW_{\infty}. There is an N×N\mathbb{N} \times \mathbb{N} family of such 11-parameter vertex algebras which, after tensoring with a Heisenberg algebra, are known as YY-algebras. They were introduced by Gaiotto and Rap\v{c}\'ak and are expected to be the building blocks for all WW-algebras in type AA, i.e., every WW-(super) algebra in type AA is an extension of a tensor product of finitely many YY-algebras. Similarly, the orthosymplectic YY-algebras are 11-parameter quotients of a universal 22-parameter vertex algebra WevW^{\text{ev}}_{\infty} of type W(2,4,6,)W(2,4,6,\dots), which is a classifying object for vertex algebras of type W(2,4,,2N)W(2,4,\dots, 2N) for some NN. Unlike type AA, these algebras are not all the building blocks for WW-algebras of types BB, CC, and DD. In this paper, we construct a new universal 22-parameter vertex algebra of type W(13,2,33,4,53,6,)W(1^3, 2, 3^3, 4, 5^3,6,\dots) which we denote by WspW^{\mathfrak{sp}}_{\infty} since it contains a copy of the affine vertex algebra Vk(sp2)V^k(\mathfrak{sp}_2). We identify 88 infinite families of 11-parameter quotients of WspW^{\mathfrak{sp}}_{\infty} which are analogues of the YY-algebras. We regard WspW^{\mathfrak{sp}}_{\infty} as a fundamental object on equal footing with WW_{\infty} and WevW^{\text{ev}}_{\infty}, and we give some heuristic reasons for why we expect the 11-parameter quotients of these three objects to be the building blocks for all WW-algebras of classical types. Finally, we prove that WspW^{\mathfrak{sp}}_{\infty} has many quotients which are strongly rational. This yields new examples of strongly rational WW-superalgebras.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2409.03465,
  title  = {Building blocks for $W$-algebras of classical types},
  author = {Thomas Creutzig and Vladimir Kovalchuk and Andrew R. Linshaw},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2409.03465},
  year   = {2025}
}

Comments

Major revision. Some errors corrected, Theorem 6.3 is new and is used to streamline the proof of Theorem 7.2

R2 v1 2026-06-28T18:35:14.409Z