More About Discrete Gauge Anomalies

Abstract

I discuss and extend several results concerning the cancellation of discrete gauge anomalies. I show how heavy fermions do not decouple in the presence of discrete gauge anomalies. As a consequence, in general, cancellation of discrete gauge anomalies cannot be described merely in terms of low energy operators involving only the light fermions. I also discuss cancellation of discrete gauge anomalies through a discrete version of the Green-Schwarz (GS) mechanism as well as the possibility of discrete gauge R-symmetries and their anomalies. Finally, some phenomenological applications are discussed. This includes symmetries guaranteeing absence of FCNC in two-Higgs models and generalized matter parities stabilizing the proton in the supersymmetric standard model. In the presence of a discrete GS mechanism or/and gauge R-symmetries, new possibilities for anomaly free such symmetries are found.