Pure Supersymmetric AdS and the Swampland

Abstract

We point out that pure supergravity theories in $AdS$ with enough supersymmetry lead, upon taking the large radius limit, to flat space quantum gravities with a nonperturbatively exact global symmetry, and are therefore in the Swampland. The argument applies to any $AdS$ supergravity with gauged R-symmetry group, including truncations of most well known examples, such as $AdS_5$ without the $S^5$ or $AdS_4$ without the $S^7$. This demonstrates that extreme scale separation, at least with enough supersymmetry, is not realizable. Moreover pure $AdS$ theories are also in conflict with some other Swampland principles including the Weak Gravity Conjecture and the (generalized) Distance Conjecture.