# References

NIKHEF 99-003

DAMTP-1999-17

hep-th/9901163

Januari 26, 1999

An index theorem for non-standard Dirac operators   
Jan-Willem van Holten, Andrew Waldron   
NIKHEF

P.O. Box 41882

1009 DB Amsterdam

The Netherlands

Kasper Peeters   
DAMTP, Cambridge University

Silver Street

Cambridge CB3 9EW

United Kingdom

t$`(8n)`$@nikhef.nl, $`n=4,3,2`$

> Abstract
> 
> On manifolds with non-trivial Killing tensors admitting a square root of the Killing-Yano type one can construct non-standard Dirac operators which differ from, but commute with, the standard Dirac operator. We relate the index problem for the non-standard Dirac operator to that of the standard Dirac operator. This necessitates a study of manifolds with torsion and boundary and we summarize recent results obtained for such manifolds.

On manifolds like the four-dimensional Kerr-Newman and Taub-NUT manifolds, the geodesic equations are integrable because of the existence of a symmetric second-rank Killing tensor $`K^{\mu \nu }`$ , allowing the construction of a constant of motion

$$K=\frac{1}{2}K^{\mu \nu }p_\mu p_\nu .$$
(1)   
The Killing tensor condition

$$K_{(\mu \nu ;\lambda )}=0$$
(2)   
is actually equivalent with the conservation of $`K`$, i.e. $`K`$ commutes with the worldline Hamiltonian

$$H=\frac{1}{2}g^{\mu \nu }p_\mu p_\nu $$
(3)   
in the sense of Poisson brackets:

$$\{K,H\}=0.$$
(4)   
Related to this, the Klein-Gordon equation with minimal electromagnetic coupling on these background spaces is soluble by separation of variables . Making use of the observation of Penrose and Floyd that such Killing tensors can have a square root of Killing-Yano-type :

$$K_{\mu \nu }=f_{\mu \lambda }f_\nu ^\lambda ,$$
(5)   
with the properties

$$f_{\mu \nu }=f_{\nu \mu },f_{\mu \nu ;\lambda }+f_{\mu \lambda ;\nu }=0,$$
(6)   
Carter and McLenaghan showed the existence of a Dirac-type linear differential operator which commutes with the standard Dirac operator . Such non-standard Dirac operators take the form

$$D_f\gamma _5\gamma ^\lambda \left(f_\lambda ^\mu D_\mu \frac{1}{3!}\sigma ^{\mu \nu }H_{\mu \nu \lambda }\right),$$
(7)   
where (in contrast to the more familiar Dirac operators associated to covariantly constant complex structures) the second term is nonzero,

$$H_{\mu \nu \lambda }=f_{[\mu \nu ;\lambda ]}=f_{\mu \nu ;\lambda }.$$
(8)   
The square brackets in the middle expression denote complete anti-symmetrization with unit weight; the last equality is obtained straightforwardly from the Killing-Yano conditions (6). In this letter we discuss the zero mode spectrum of such Dirac operators (see  for a systematic classification of manifolds admitting solutions to (6)).

The covariant derivative $`D_\mu `$ includes the standard spin-connection term:

$$D_\mu =_\mu \frac{1}{2}\omega _\mu ^{ab}\sigma _{ab},$$
(9)   
with the $`\sigma _{ab}`$ the usual Dirac representation of the generators of the Lorentz group on spinors. In the following we frequently use the representation of vectors and tensors in local Lorentz components, obtained by contraction with a vielbein $`e_\mu ^a`$ or the inverse vielbein $`e_a^\mu `$, e.g.

$$f_\mu ^a=f_\mu ^\nu e_\nu ^a,c_{abc}=e_a^\mu e_b^\nu e_c^\lambda H_{\mu \nu \lambda }.$$
(10)   
In this notation one can write the Dirac operator (7) as

$$D_f=\gamma _5\gamma ^a\left(f_a^\mu D_\mu \frac{1}{3!}\sigma ^{bc}c_{abc}\right).$$
(11)   
The standard Dirac operator (without torsion) is

$$D=i\gamma ^ae_a^\mu D_\mu ;$$
(12)   
then the Killing-Yano properties of $`f_a^\mu `$ guarantee the commutation relation

$$[D_f,D]=0.$$
(13)   
Thus, the standard and non-standard Dirac operators can be diagonalized simultaneously, which is at the root of Chandrasekhar’s observation that the Dirac equation in the Kerr-Newman solution is separable . We stress that although one often formulates the commutation relation (13) in terms of Poisson brackets (for example, in classical studies of spinning particles), when examining index problems it is essential that one considers quantum commutators.

In even-dimensional spaces one can define the index of a Dirac operator as the difference in the number of linearly independent zero modes with eigenvalue +1 and $`1`$ under $`\gamma _5`$:

$$\mathrm{index}\left(D\right)=n_+^0n_{}^0.$$
(14)   
The index is useful as a tool to investigate topological properties of the base-space, as well as in computing anomalies in quantum field theory; for a review see e.g. . Eq.(13) now leads to a simple but remarkable result for the index of the non-standard Dirac operator $`D_f`$, to wit the   
theorem:

$$\mathrm{index}\left(D_f\right)=\mathrm{index}\left(D\right).$$
(15)   
Below we sketch the proof of this theorem and discuss some of its possible implications.

Let $`|\lambda ,\mu `$ denote an orthonormal basis of simultaneous eigenvectors of the standard and non-standard Dirac operators:

$$D|\lambda ,\mu =\lambda |\lambda ,\mu ,D_f|\lambda ,\mu =\mu |\lambda ,\mu .$$
(16)   
Now as $`\gamma _5`$ anti-commutes with each of the Dirac operators, all non-zero eigenvalues occur in pairs of opposite signs:

$$D\gamma _5|\lambda ,\mu =\gamma _5D|\lambda ,\mu =\lambda \gamma _5|\lambda ,\mu ,$$
(17)   
and similarly for $`D_f`$. Projecting the states of fixed eigenvalue onto the eigenstates of $`\gamma _5`$:

$$|\lambda ,\mu ;\pm \frac{1}{2}\left(1\pm \gamma _5\right)|\lambda ,\mu ,$$
(18)   
one obtains the equivalent results

$$\begin{array}{c}\gamma _5|\lambda ,\mu ;\pm =\pm |\lambda ,\mu ;\pm ,\hfill \\ \\ D|\lambda ,\mu ;\pm =\lambda |\lambda ,\mu ;,D_f|\lambda ,\mu ;\pm =\mu |\lambda ,\mu ;.\hfill \end{array}$$
(19)   
On the other hand, for the zero-modes a mismatch between positive and negative chirality states may occur. Note however, that even in the kernel of the Dirac operator $`D`$ the pairing of chirality eigenstates holds for those vectors which are non-zero modes of $`D_f`$:

$$D_f|0,\mu ;\pm =\mu |0,\mu ;.$$
(20)   
Therefore the only states in the kernel of $`D`$ which can contribute to the index $`\mathrm{index}(D)`$ are the simultaneous zero modes of $`D`$ and $`D_f`$, i.e. the states $`|0,0;\pm `$. Denoting the number of positive, resp. negative, chirality double-zero modes by $`n_\pm ^{(0,0)}`$, the index of the standard Dirac operator is

$$\mathrm{index}\left(D\right)=n_+^{(0,0)}n_{}^{(0,0)}.$$
(21)   
Now the symmetry of the algebra of (anti-)commutation relations of $`D`$, $`D_f`$ and $`\gamma _5`$ under interchange of $`D`$ and $`D_f`$ implies, that again only the simultaneous zero-modes of $`D_f`$ and $`D`$ contribute to the index of the non-standard Dirac operator $`D_f`$; hence

$$\mathrm{index}\left(D_f\right)=n_+^{(0,0)}n_{}^{(0,0)}=\mathrm{index}\left(D\right).$$
(22)   
This is the result we set out to prove.

We now comment on some interesting consequences of this theorem. It is well-known  that the index of a Dirac operator can be computed using path-integral methods, being identical to the Witten index of a supersymmetric quantum mechanical model for a spinning particle with supercharge

$$Q=e_a^\mu \mathrm{\Pi }_\mu \psi ^a.$$
(23)   
Here $`\psi ^a`$ is the anti-commuting spin variable of the particle, forming a $`d=1`$ supermultiplet with the base-space co-ordinates $`x^\mu `$ , and $`\mathrm{\Pi }_\mu `$ is the covariant momentum of the particle, which is related to the canonical momentum $`p_\mu `$ by

$$\mathrm{\Pi }_\mu =p_\mu +\frac{i}{2}\omega _{\mu ab}\psi ^a\psi ^b.$$
(24)   
The existence of a Killing-Yano tensor and a non-standard Dirac operator on the base-manifold now manifests itself as a new non-standard supersymmetry  with supercharge

$$Q_f=f_a^\mu \mathrm{\Pi }_\mu \psi ^a+\frac{i}{3!}c_{abc}\psi ^a\psi ^b\psi ^c.$$
(25)   
The main algebraic properties of the supercharges under Dirac-Poisson brackets are

$$\{Q,Q\}=2iH,\{Q_f,Q\}=\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}0},\{Q_f,Q_f\}=2iK,$$
(26)   
where $`K`$ now represents the supersymmetric extension of the Killing constant (2); for example, in the case of Kerr-Newman space-time it is the supersymmetric extension of Carter’s constant . Let us again stress that for the study of the index, where one is interested in the spectrum of states, one must consider the quantization of the spinning particle model. This problem is taken up in detail in 

One may expect that the equality of the indices of the standard and non-standard Dirac operators now translates to the equality of the Witten index for the standard and non-standard supersymmetry. However, this translation involves some subtleties, which we briefly discuss here. First, let us recall that the Witten index is defined as the difference between the number of odd and even fermion number zero modes of the Hamiltonian of a supersymmetric theory, which may be computed in regularized form as 

$$\mathrm{index}_w=\underset{\beta 0}{lim}\text{Tr}\left((1)^Fe^{\beta H}\right).$$
(27)   
Here $`H`$ is the Hamiltonian, obtained as the square of the standard supercharge. The formula in (27) makes only definite sense once one understands what is meant by the symbol “Tr”. Of course one should really view this as a sum over the spectrum of the regulator however, even then three distinct cases can occur . (I) The spectrum is discrete, in which case all states save for the zero modes cancel pairwise and the index is some $`\beta `$-independent integer counting the disparity between positive and negative chirality zero modes. (II) The spectrum includes a continuum separated from the (discrete) zero mode sector by a gap. Then, so long as one can show that the densities of positive and negative non-zero modes are equal, the result is again an integer independent of $`\beta `$. (III) The spectrum includes a continuum not separated from zero in which case the index is no longer guaranteed to be integer nor $`\beta `$-independent. For the case we are interested in, namely the chiral gravitational anomaly on manifolds with boundary, Atiyah, Patodi and Singer  have shown how to impose boundary conditions for spinors which ensure a well-posed index problem (case (I) in fact). Essentially their non-local boundary conditions stipulate the spectrum of the bulk modes in terms of the discrete spectrum of the compact boundary manifold (see  for further details).

Similarly, a quantity for the non-standard supersymmetry can be obtained by defining the regularized expression

$$\mathrm{index}_f=\underset{\beta 0}{lim}\text{Tr}\left((1)^Fe^{\beta K}\right).$$
(28)   
The equality of the indices then is equivalent to the statement that taking the limit $`\beta 0`$ these two expressions are equal:

$$\mathrm{index}_f=\mathrm{index}_w.$$
(29)   
Comparison of the two expressions shows, that $`\mathrm{index}_f`$ actually is to be interpreted as the Witten index of a theory in which $`K`$ is the Hamiltonian. The relation between the theories of which $`H`$, resp. $`K`$ are the Hamiltonians was investigated in detail in . Here we recall in particular two results of that paper:

1. If $`K`$ is a Killing-Carter constant of motion with respect to the Hamiltonian $`H`$, then $`H`$ is a constant of motion in the theory with Hamiltonian $`K`$.   
Corollary: if $`K_{\mu \nu }`$ is a symmetric Killing tensor on a manifold with metric $`g_{\mu \nu }`$, then $`g_{\mu \nu }`$ is a symmetric Killing tensor on a manifold with metric $`K_{\mu \nu }`$. Following  we call this reciprocal relation between manifolds with metrics and Killing tensors interchanged a Killing duality.
2. The correspondence can be extended to supercharges in the following way: if $`Q_f`$ is a non-standard Killing-Yano supercharge in a theory with standard supercharge $`Q`$ and Hamiltonian $`H`$, then $`Q`$ is a Killing-Yano supercharge in a dual theory with supercharge $`Q_f`$ and Hamiltonian $`K`$; but if $`H`$ and $`K`$ are different then at least one of the manifolds is endowed with torsion. This is because of the inclusion of the totally anti-symmetric tensor $`c_{abc}`$ in the supercharge $`Q_f`$, as well as in the corresponding non-standard Dirac operator $`D_f`$.

In order to implement the definition (28) and prove the equality (29) it is therefore necessary to study index theorems on manifolds with torsion. Furthermore, typically the manifolds in question (e.g. Taub–NUT and Kerr–Newman) have a boundary. Index theorems on manifolds with boundary are the subject of the Atiyah–Patodi–Singer (APS) index theorem. The extension of their work to include torsion has recently been given in . This is a rather intricate subject. In particular, if one wishes to regard the Dirac operators $`D`$ and $`D_f`$ as operators on independent manifolds then one has to carefully study the Hilbert spaces in which they act. These and other detailed issues have been handled in depth in  so here we simply provide a summary of the most important results.

On manifolds with boundary the index splits into three terms. The first is the bulk contribution which can be obtained by a heat kernel, Pauli–Villars or supersymmetric path integral approach. This term has been independently computed by several groups  and the result is

$$\mathrm{index}(\mathrm{bulk})=\frac{1}{24.8\pi ^2}_{}\left[R(e)^{mn}R(e)_{nm}\frac{1}{2}F(A)F(A)2\sqrt{g}D_\mu 𝒦^\mu \right].$$
(30)   
Here $`F(A)`$ is the abelian field strength of the one form obtained by dualising the totally antisymmetric part of the torsion (remember that the Dirac operator couples only to the trace and totally antisymmetric parts of the contortion tensor). The vector $`𝒦^\mu `$ is given by

$$𝒦^\mu =\left(D^\nu D_\nu +\frac{1}{4}A^\nu A_\nu +\frac{1}{2}R\right)A^\mu .$$
(31)   
The second term required for the index is a boundary correction term given by the APS $`\eta `$ invariant. The idea is quite simple, when the manifold is of product form near the boundary (i.e. a cylinder with the boundary manifold as cross section) the solutions of the Dirac equation can be derived directly from the solutions of the boundary Dirac operator. Therefore APS have proven that the additional correction can be constructed directly from the eigenvalues of the boundary Dirac operator

$$\text{index(boundary)}=\frac{1}{2}\left(\eta (0)+h\right),$$
(32)   
where $`h`$ denotes the number of zero modes of the boundary Dirac operator and the $`\eta `$ invariant is given by

$$\eta (s)=\underset{\{l0\}}{}\frac{\mathrm{sign}(l)}{|l|^s}$$
(33)   
with the sum running over the set of all non-vanishing eigenvalues $`\{l0\}`$ of the boundary Dirac operator. Observe that $`\eta (0)`$ essentially counts the disparity between the number of positive and negative boundary eigenvalues. Typically $`\eta (0)`$ must be computed on a case by case basis, however for boundary manifolds given by a squashed $`S^3`$ this computation has been performed some time ago by Hitchin . The generalization of this computation to the torsion-full case may again be found in .

Of course, one is not always so lucky enough to have a manifold approaching a cylinder near the boundary so that in the most general case a third correction is necessary. In the torsion-free case this correction was found by Gilkey  and amounts to the boundary integral over the difference between the Chern–Simons form of the product manifold obtained by extending the boundary three-manifold to a cylinder and the Chern–Simons form of the actual four-manifold in question. In the torsion-full case, in  it is shown how to extract a generalized Chern–Simons from the integrand of (30). Denoting quantities computed on the product manifold by the sharp symbol, the generalized Chern–Simons correction to the index is given by

$$\text{index(CS correction)}=\frac{1}{24.8\pi ^2}_{}\left[C^{\mathrm{}}(A)2𝒦^{\mathrm{}}C(A)+2𝒦\right].$$
(34)   
Note that $`𝒦`$ denotes the three form obtain by dualising the vector $`𝒦^\mu `$ in (31).

Finally, it is enlightening to see all these corrections computed in an explicit example. The case of Taub–NUT and its torsion-full dual have been analysed in . For the Taub–NUT manifold with metric

$$\mathrm{d}s^2=\frac{r+2m}{r}\left[\mathrm{d}r^2+r^2\mathrm{d}\theta ^2+r^2\mathrm{sin}^2\theta \mathrm{d}\varphi ^2\right]+\frac{4rm^2}{r+2m}\left[\mathrm{d}\psi +\mathrm{cos}\theta \mathrm{d}\varphi \right]^2,$$
(35)   
the bulk contribution was calculated to be $`1/12`$ by Hawking . There is no clash with the expectation of integer counting of zero modes by the index since the boundary corrections of APS (as computed by Hitchin) and Gilkey were shown to exactly cancel the bulk term  so that the final result for the index of the Taub–NUT manifold is exactly zero. Therefore, we would expect, from the considerations above, also a vanishing result for the index of the dual manifold with metric given by

$$\mathrm{d}s_f^2=\frac{r+2m}{r}\left[\mathrm{d}r^2+\frac{m^2r^2}{(r+m)^2}\left(\mathrm{d}\theta ^2+\mathrm{sin}^2\theta \mathrm{d}\varphi ^2\right)\right]+\frac{4rm^2}{r+2m}\left(\mathrm{d}\psi +\mathrm{cos}\theta \mathrm{d}\varphi \right)^2$$
(36)   
The anticommutativity of the Dirac operators $`D`$ and $`D_f`$ holds when the dual manifold has antisymmetric torsion given by

$$T=\frac{4r^2m^2\mathrm{sin}\theta }{(r+m)^2}\mathrm{d}\theta \mathrm{d}\varphi \mathrm{d}\psi .$$
(37)   
In fact the results for the three contributions (30), (32) and (34) to the index of the dual Dirac operator $`D_f`$ are given by each of the following three lines respectively 

$`\mathrm{index}D_f`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{r_b^8+12r_b^7m+86r_b^6m^2+340r_b^5m^3+753r_b^4m^4+872r_b^3m^5+408r_b^2m^6}{12(r_b+2m)^4(r_b+m)^4}}`$ (38)   
$`{\displaystyle \frac{r_b^8+12r_b^7m+86r_b^6m^2+308r_b^5m^3+569r_b^4m^4+552r_b^3m^5+264r_b^2m^6+48r_bm^7}{12(r_b+2m)^4(r_b+m)^4}}`$   
$`{\displaystyle \frac{32r_b^5m^3+184r_b^4m^4+320r_b^3m^5+144r_b^2m^648r_bm^7}{12(r_b+2m)^4(r_b+m)^4}}`$   
$`=`$ $`\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}0}.`$   
Note that the vanishing result holds for any positive radius to the boundary $`r_b`$ and this is a very strong test of the formalism presented. Let us conclude by remarking that in theories with local supersymmetry, torsion is inevitably present. Furthermore boundary physics in these theories has become increasingly important , a fact which highlights the interest of our work.

Acknowledgement For two of us (J.W.v.H. and A.W.) this work is part of the research programme of the Foundation for Fundamental Research of Matter (FOM).