Numerical tools to validate stationary points of SO(8)-gauged N=8 D=4 supergravity
Abstract
Until recently, the preferred strategy to identify stationary points in the scalar potential of SO(8)-gauged N=8 supergravity in D=4 has been to consider truncations of the potential to sub-manifolds of E7(+7)/SU(8) that are invariant under some postulated residual gauge group G of SO(8). As powerful alternative strategies have been shown to exist that allow one to go far beyond what this method can achieve -- and in particular have produced numerous solutions that break the SO(8) gauge group to no continuous residual symmetry -- independent verification of results becomes a problem due to both the complexity of the scalar potential and the large number of new solutions. This article introduces a conceptually simple self-contained piece of computer code that allows independent numerical validation of claims on the locations of newly discovered stationary points.