Six-Dimensional Superconformal Theories and their Compactifications from Type IIA Supergravity

Abstract

We describe three analytic classes of infinitely many AdS_d supersymmetric solutions of massive IIA supergravity, for d = 7, 5, 4. The three classes are related by simple universal maps. For example, the AdS_7 x M_3 solutions (where M_3 is topologically S^3) are mapped to AdS_5 x Sigma_2 x M'_3, where Sigma_2 is a Riemann surface of genus g >= 2 and the metric on M'_3 is obtained by distorting M_3 in a certain way. The solutions can have localized D6 or O6 sources, as well as an arbitrary number of D8-branes. The AdS_7 case (previously known only numerically) is conjecturally dual to an NS5-D6-D8 system. The field theories in three and four dimensions are not known, but their number of degrees of freedom can be computed in the supergravity approximation. The AdS_4 solutions have numerical "attractor" generalizations that might be useful for flux compactification purposes.