Supersymmetric spindles

Abstract

Abstract In the context of holography, we analyse aspects of supersymmetric geometries based on two-dimensional orbifolds known as spindles. By analysing spinc spinors on a spindle with an azimuthal rotation symmetry we show that under rather general conditions there are just two possibilities, called the ‘twist’ and the ‘anti-twist’, which are determined by the quantized magnetic flux through the spindle. A special case of the twist is the standard topological twist which is associated with constant and chiral spinors. We construct solutions of D = 5 and D = 4 STU gauged supergravity theories that are dual to D3-branes and M2-branes wrapping spindles, respectively, which realize both the anti-twist, as seen before, but also the twist. For the wrapped D3-brane solutions we reproduce the central charge of the gravity solution from the dual field theory by analysing the anomaly polynomial of $$ \mathcal{N} $$ N = 4 SYM theory. We also discuss M5-branes wrapped on spindles both from a gravity and a field theory point of view.