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Spontaneously Broken (-1)-form symmetries
February 23, 2024 @ 10:00 am - 11:30 am
![](https://cmsa.fas.harvard.edu/media/CMSA-QMMP-02.23.2024.png)
Quantum Matter in Mathematics and Physics Seminar
Speaker: Motoo Suzuki (Harvard)
Title: Spontaneously Broken (-1)-form symmetries
Abstract: Spontaneous breaking of symmetries leads to universal phenomena. We extend this notion to (−1)-form U(1) symmetries. The spontaneous breaking is diagnosed by a dependence of the vacuum energy on a constant background field θ, which can be probed by the topological susceptibility. This leads to a reinterpretation of the Strong CP problem as arising from a spontaneously broken instantonic symmetry in QCD. We discuss how known solutions to the problem are unified in this framework and explore some, so far unsuccessful, attempts to find new solutions. I will also talk about our ongoing work on the explicit breaking by monopoles.