Novel Properties of Massive Higher Spin Fields

Abstract

I outline a series of results obtained in collaboration with A. Waldron on the properties of massive higher (s>1) spin fields in cosmological, constant curvature, backgrounds and the resulting unexpected qualitative effects on their degrees of freedom and unitarity properties. The dimensional parameter $Ł$ extends the flat space m-line to a $(m^2,Ł)$ "phase" plane in which these novel phenomena unfold. In this light, I discuss a possible partial resurrection of deSitter supergravity. I will also exhibit the well-known causality problems of coupling these systems to gravity and, for complex fields, to electromagnetism, systematizing some of the occasionally misunderstood obstacles to interactions, particularly for s = 3/2 and 2.

9 pages, 1 figure. Invited talk at "Renormalization Group and Anomalies in Gravity and Cosmology", Ouro Preto, Brazil, March 17-23, 2003