Gravitational interactions of higher-spin fermions

Abstract

Abstract We investigate the cubic interactions of a massless higher-spin fermion with gravity in flat space and present covariant 2 − s − s vertices, compatible with the gauge symmetries of the system, preserving parity. This explicit construction relies on the BRST deformation scheme that assumes locality and Poincaré invariance. Consistent nontrivial cubic deformations exclude minimal gravitational coupling and may appear only with a number of derivatives constrained in a given range. Derived in an independent manner, our results do agree with those obtained from the light-cone formulation or inspired by string theory. We also show that none of the Abelian vertices deform the gauge transformations, while all the non-Abelian ones are obstructed in a local theory beyond the cubic order.