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Higher representations for extended operators

High Energy Physics - Theory 2023-06-06 v2 Strongly Correlated Electrons Mathematical Physics Category Theory math.MP Quantum Algebra

Abstract

It is known that local operators in quantum field theory transform in representations of ordinary global symmetry groups. The purpose of this paper is to generalise this statement to extended operators such as line and surface defects. We explain that (n1)(n-1)-dimensional operators transform in nn-representations of a finite invertible or group-like symmetry and thoroughly explore this statement for n=1,2,3n = 1,2,3. We therefore propose higher representation theory as the natural framework to describe the action of symmetries on the extended operator content in quantum field theory.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2304.03789,
  title  = {Higher representations for extended operators},
  author = {Thomas Bartsch and Mathew Bullimore and Andrea Grigoletto},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2304.03789},
  year   = {2023}
}

Comments

60 pages + appendix. v2: minor corrections

R2 v1 2026-06-28T09:54:50.685Z