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# Finite growth representations of infinite Lie conformal algebras

## 1 Introduction

In this paper we study representation theory of some infinite rank subalgebras of the Lie conformal algebra $`gc_1`$ associated to the Lie algebra $`𝒟`$ of differential operators on the circle. Recall that $`gc_1=[,x]`$, with $`\lambda `$-bracket given by (see , )

$$[a(,x)_\lambda b(,x)]=a(\lambda ,\lambda ++x)b(\lambda +,x)b(\lambda +,\lambda +x)a(\lambda ,x)$$

Also recall that the Virasoro conformal algebra (which is particularly important in physics) is defined as the free $`[]`$-module of rank 1 generated by an element $`L`$, with $`\lambda `$-bracket defined by

$$[L_\lambda L]=(2\lambda +)L,$$

and extended to $`[]L`$ using sesquilinearity. Observe that all Virasoro subalgebras of $`gc_1`$ are generated by

$$L=x+\alpha ,\alpha .$$

The complete list of infinite rank proper subalgebras of $`gc_1`$ that contain a Virasoro subalgebra is (see  and Remark 3.10 in ):

$`gc_{1,x}`$ $`=`$ $`x[,x]`$
$`oc_1`$ $`=`$ $`\{a(,x)a(,x)|a(,x)[,x]\}`$
$`spc_1`$ $`=`$ $`\{x[a(,x)+a(,x)]|a(,x)[,x]\}`$
where the Virasoro element is $`x+\alpha `$, with $`\alpha =0,\frac{1}{2},0`$ respectively. They are the most important $`gc_1`$-subalgebras from the point of view of physics.

In the present paper we classify all finite growth representations of all infinite rank conformal subalgebras of $`gc_1`$ that contain a Virasoro subalgebra.

This problem reduces to the study of finite growth representations on the corresponding extended annihilation algebras, which are certain subalgebras of $`𝒟`$ (see ). The main tools used here are the recent results (,,, and ) on the classification of quasifinite highest weight modules over the central extension of $`𝒟`$ and some of its important subalgebras.

The paper is organized as follows. In Section 2, we describe the infinite rank Lie algebra $`\widehat{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$ and its classical subalgebras, and discuss their representation theory that will be needed. In sections 3,4,5, and 6, we obtain the classification of all finite growth representations of $`gc_1`$, $`gc_{1,x}`$, $`oc_1`$, and $`spc_1`$ respectively.

## 2 Lie algebra $`\widehat{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$ and its classical subalgebras

### 2.1 Lie algebra $`\widehat{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$

Denote by $`^+\mathrm{}`$ the set of all sequences $`\lambda =(\lambda _1,\lambda _2,\mathrm{})`$ for which all but a finite number of $`\lambda _i`$’s are zero, and let $`d(\lambda )`$ denote the number of non-zero $`\lambda _i`$’s and $`|\lambda |`$ denote their sum. Denote by $`Par^+`$ the subset of $`^+\mathrm{}`$ consisting of non-increasing sequences of (non-negative) integers.

Denote by $`g\mathrm{}_+\mathrm{}`$ the Lie algebra of all matrices $`(a_{ij})_{i,j=1}^+\mathrm{}`$ with a finite number of non-zero entries $`a_{ij}`$. Given $`\lambda ^+\mathrm{}`$, there exists a unique irreducible $`g\mathrm{}_+\mathrm{}`$-module $`L^+(\lambda )`$, also denoted by $`L(g\mathrm{}_+\mathrm{};\lambda )`$, which admits a non-zero vector $`v_\lambda `$ such that

$$E_{ij}v_\lambda =0\text{ for }i<j\text{ and }E_{ii}v_\lambda =\lambda _iv_\lambda .$$
(2.1)
Here and further $`E_{ij}`$ denotes, as usual, the matrix whose $`(i,j)`$-entry is $`1`$ and all other entries are $`0`$. Each $`L^+(\lambda )`$ has a unique $`_+`$-gradation. $`L^+(\lambda )=_{j_+}`$ $`L^+(\lambda )_j`$, called its *principal gradation*, which satisfies the properties

$$L^+(\lambda )_0=v_\lambda ,E_{ij}L^+(\lambda )_kL^+(\lambda )_{k+ij}.$$

Since $`\lambda ^+\mathrm{}`$, it is easy to see that $`dimL^+(\lambda )_j<\mathrm{}`$, hence we can define the $`q`$-character

$$\mathrm{ch}_qL^+(\lambda )=\underset{j_+}{}(dimL^+(\lambda )_j)q^j.$$

For $`\lambda Par^+`$, let $`d=d(\lambda )`$ and $`\overline{\lambda }=(\lambda _1,\mathrm{},\lambda _d)`$. Let $`g\mathrm{}_d`$ be the Lie algebra of all $`d\times d`$ matrices $`(a_{ij})_{i,j=1}^d`$; it may be viewed as a subalgebra of $`g\mathrm{}_+\mathrm{}`$ in a natural way. Denote by $`\overline{L}^+(\overline{\lambda })`$ the (irreducible) $`g\mathrm{}_d`$-submodule of $`L^+(\lambda )`$ generated by $`v_\lambda `$. It is, of course, isomorphic to the finite-dimensional irreducible $`g\mathrm{}_d`$-module associated to $`\overline{\lambda }`$, so that its $`q`$-character is a (well-known) polynomial in $`q`$.

###### Lemma 2.1.

Let $`\lambda Par^+,d=d(\lambda )`$. Then

$$\mathrm{ch}_qL^+(\lambda )=ch_q\overline{L}^+(\overline{\lambda })/\underset{j=1}{\overset{d}{}}(1q^j)_q^{\lambda _{dj+1}},$$

where $`(1a)_q^m=(1a)(1qa)\mathrm{}(1q^{m1}a)`$.

###### Proof.

Recall the well-known formula (see ):

$$\mathrm{ch}_qL^+(\lambda )=\underset{\alpha >0}{}(1q^{\lambda +\rho ,\alpha })/(1q^{\rho ,\alpha }).$$
(2.2)
Here the product is taken over the set of all positive coroots of $`g\mathrm{}_+\mathrm{}`$, which are all elements $`E_{ii}E_{jj}`$ with $`i<j`$, $`\lambda ,E_{ii}=\lambda _i`$ and $`\rho ,E_{ii}=i`$. Of course, a similar formula holds for $`\mathrm{ch}_q\overline{L}^+(\overline{\lambda })`$; it is a part of the product (2.2) corresponding to $`i<jd`$.

It is also clear that the factors of (2.2) corresponding to $`d<i<j`$ are equal to $`1`$, and it is easy to see that the product over all pairs $`i,j`$ with fixed $`id`$ and all $`j>d`$ is equal to $`1/(1q^{di+1})_q^{\lambda _i}`$.

Recall that, given a vector space $`V`$ with an increasing filtration by finite-dimensional subspaces $`V_{[j]}`$, the *growth* of $`V`$ is defined by

$$growthV=\overline{lim}_{j+\mathrm{}}(\mathrm{log}dimV_{[j]})/\mathrm{log}j.$$

We define the growth of $`L^+(\lambda )`$ using its filtration $`L^+(\lambda )_{[j]}=_{ij}L^+(\lambda )_i`$ associated to the principal gradation.

###### Theorem 2.2.

1. If $`\lambda Par^+`$, then

$$growthL^+(\lambda )=|\lambda |.$$
2. If $`\lambda ^+\mathrm{}\backslash Par^+`$, then $`growthL^+(\lambda )=\mathrm{}`$.

###### Proof.

It follows from Lemma 2.1 that for $`\lambda Par^+`$, $`growthL^+(\lambda )`$ is equal to the growth of the polynomial algebra on generators of degree $`1,2,\mathrm{},\lambda _s`$; $`2,3,\mathrm{},\lambda _{s1}+1`$; $`\mathrm{}`$; $`s,s+1,\mathrm{},\lambda _1+s1`$. The total number of these generators is $`|\lambda |`$, and since growth of a polynomial algebra is independent of the degrees of generators, (a) is proved.

Let now $`\lambda ^+\mathrm{}\backslash Par^+`$. Then $`\lambda _k\lambda _{k+1}_+`$ for some $`k`$. But then $`E_{k+1,k}^Nv_\lambda 0`$ for each $`N_+`$. Looking at the subalgebra of $`g\mathrm{}_+\mathrm{}`$ spanned by all $`E_{ij}`$ with $`i,jk+1`$, we conclude from (a) that

$$growthL^+(\lambda )N+\underset{ik+1}{}\lambda _i.$$

This proves (b). ∎

In a similar fashion one may consider the Lie algebra $`g\mathrm{}_{\mathrm{}}`$ of all matrices $`(a_{ij})_{i,j=0}^{\mathrm{}}`$ with a finite number of non-zero entries and the irreducible $`g\mathrm{}_{\mathrm{}}`$-modules $`L^{}(\lambda )`$, also denoted by $`L(g\mathrm{}_{\mathrm{}};\lambda )`$, parameterized by the set $`^{\mathrm{}}`$ of sequences $`\mu =(\mathrm{},\mu _1,\mu _0)`$ with finitely many non-zero members. Results similar to Lemma 2.1 and Theorem 2.2 hold for the subset $`Par^{}^{\mathrm{}}`$ consisting of non-increasing sequences of (non-positive) integers.

Let $`\stackrel{~}{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}`$ denote the Lie algebra of all matrices $`(a_{ij})_{i,j}`$ such that $`a_{ij}=0`$ if $`|ij|0`$. Denote by $`\stackrel{~}{g\mathrm{}}_+\mathrm{}`$ (resp. $`\stackrel{~}{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}`$) the subalgebra of $`\stackrel{~}{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}`$ consisting of matrices with $`a_{ij}=0`$ for $`i`$ or $`j0`$ (resp. $`i`$ or $`j>0`$). Note that these two subalgebras commute and that $`\stackrel{~}{g\mathrm{}}_\pm \mathrm{}`$ contains $`g\mathrm{}_\pm \mathrm{}`$ as a subalgebra. Note also that the $`g\mathrm{}_\pm \mathrm{}`$-modules $`L^\pm (\lambda )`$ extend uniquely to $`\stackrel{~}{g\mathrm{}}_\pm \mathrm{}`$.

The Lie algebra $`\stackrel{~}{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}`$ has a well-known central extension $`\widehat{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}=\stackrel{~}{g\mathrm{}}+C`$ by $``$ defined by the cocycle

$$\alpha (A,B)=tr[J,A]B,\text{ where }J=\underset{i0}{}E_{ii}.$$
(2.3)
The restriction of this cocycle to $`\stackrel{~}{g\mathrm{}}_+\mathrm{}`$ and to $`\stackrel{~}{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}`$ is zero.

We will also need briefly the Lie algebra $`\widehat{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$ defined for each $`m_+`$ by replacing $``$ by $`R_m=[u]/(u^{m+1})`$. That is, $`\widehat{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}=\stackrel{~}{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}R_m`$ is the central extension of $`\stackrel{~}{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$ by the 2-cocycle (2.3) with values in $`R_m`$, where $`\stackrel{~}{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$ is the Lie algebra of infinite matrices with finitely many nonzero diagonals with entries in $`R_m`$.

The principal $``$-gradation of all the above Lie algebras is defined by letting

$$\mathrm{deg}E_{ij}=ij$$
(2.4)
(in the case of $`\widehat{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$ we also let $`\mathrm{deg}R_m=0`$). This gives us a triangular decomposition

$$\widehat{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}=(\widehat{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]})_+(\widehat{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]})_0(\widehat{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]})_{},$$

where

$$(\widehat{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]})_\pm =_j(\widehat{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]})_{\pm j}$$

The Lie algebra $`\widehat{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}`$ has a family of modules $`L(\widehat{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}};\lambda ,c)`$, parameterized by $`\lambda ^{\mathrm{}}=\{(\lambda _i)_i|`$ all but finitely many of $`\lambda _i`$ are $`0\}`$ and $`c`$, defined by (2.1) and $`Cv_\lambda =cv_\lambda `$. Similarly, $`\widehat{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$ has a family of modules $`L(\widehat{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]};\stackrel{}{\lambda },\stackrel{}{c})`$, where $`\stackrel{}{\lambda }(^{\mathrm{}})^{m+1}`$, $`\stackrel{}{c}^{m+1}`$, defined in a similar fashion. That is, the highest weight $`\widehat{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$-module $`L(\widehat{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]};\mathrm{\Lambda })`$, with highest weight $`\mathrm{\Lambda }(\widehat{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]})_0^{}`$ that is determined by its labels $`\stackrel{}{\lambda }_i^{(j)}=\mathrm{\Lambda }(u^jE_{ii})`$ and the central charges $`\stackrel{}{c}_j=\mathrm{\Lambda }(u^j)`$.

The gradation (2.4) is obviously consistent with the principal gradation of $`L^\pm (\lambda )`$ and of $`L(\widehat{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}};\lambda ,c)`$.

### 2.2 Lie algebras $`b_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$ and $`d_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$

The Lie algebra $`\stackrel{~}{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$ acts on the vector space $`R_m[t,t^1]`$ via the usual formula

$$E_{ij}v_k=\delta _{j,k}v_i,$$

where $`v_i=t^i,i`$ is an $`R_m`$-basis. Now consider the following $``$-bilinear forms on this space:

$`B(u^mv_i,u^nv_j)`$ $`=`$ $`u^m(u^n)\delta _{i,j}`$
$`D(u^mv_i,u^nv_j)`$ $`=`$ $`u^m(u^n)\delta _{i,1j}.`$
Denote by $`\overline{b}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$ (resp. $`\overline{d}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$) the Lie subalgebra of $`\stackrel{~}{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$ which preserves the bilinear form $`B`$ (resp. $`D`$). We have

$`\overline{b}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$ $`=`$ $`\{(a_{ij}(u))_{i,j}\stackrel{~}{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}|a_{ij}(u)=a_{j,i}(u)\}`$
$`\overline{d}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$ $`=`$ $`\{(a_{ij}(u))_{i,j}\stackrel{~}{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}|a_{ij}(u)=a_{1j,1i}(u)\}.`$
Denote by $`b_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}=\overline{b}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}R_m`$ (resp. $`d_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}=\overline{d}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}R_m`$) the central extension of $`\overline{b}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$ (resp. $`\overline{d}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$) given by the 2-cocycle defined in $`\stackrel{~}{g}\mathrm{}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$. Both subalgebras inherits form $`\widehat{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$ the principal $``$-gradation and the triangular decomposition, (see  and  for notation)

$`b_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$ $`=`$ $`_j(b_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]})_jb_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}=(b_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]})_+(b_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]})_0(b_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]})_{}`$
$`d_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$ $`=`$ $`_j(d_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]})_jd_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}=(d_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]})_+(d_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]})_0(d_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]})_{}.`$
In particular when $`m=0`$, we have the usual Lie subalgebras of $`\widehat{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}`$, denoted by $`b_{\mathrm{}}`$ (resp. $`d_{\mathrm{}}`$).

Denote by $`L(b_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]};\lambda )`$ (resp. $`L(d_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]};\lambda )`$) the highest weight module over $`b_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$ (resp. $`d_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$) with highest weight $`\lambda (b_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]})_0^{}`$ (resp. $`\lambda (d_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]})_0^{}`$) parametrized by $`{}_{}{}^{b}\stackrel{}{\lambda }(^{\mathrm{}})^{m+1}`$, $`\stackrel{}{c}^{m+1}`$, with

$`\stackrel{}{c}_i`$ $`=`$ $`\lambda (u^i),`$
$`{}_{}{}^{b}\stackrel{}{\lambda }_{j}^{(i)}`$ $`=`$ $`\lambda (u^iE_{j,j}(u)^iE_{j,j}),`$
(resp. $`{}_{}{}^{d}\stackrel{}{\lambda }(^{\mathrm{}})^{m+1}`$, with $`{}_{}{}^{d}\stackrel{}{\lambda }_{j}^{(i)}=\lambda (u^iE_{j,j}(u)^iE_{1j,1j})`$). The superscripts $`b`$ and $`d`$ here mean B and D type respectively. The $`{}_{}{}^{b}\stackrel{}{\lambda }_{j}^{(i)}`$ (resp. $`{}_{}{}^{d}\stackrel{}{\lambda }_{j}^{(i)}`$) are called the labels and $`\stackrel{}{c}_j`$ the central charges of $`L(b_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]};\lambda )`$ (resp. $`L(d_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]};\lambda )`$).

All these modules will appear in Section 5. Now, we are interested in representation theory of $`b_{\mathrm{}}`$.

The set of simple coroots of $`b_{\mathrm{}}`$, can be described as follows (cf. ):

$`\mathrm{\Pi }\stackrel{ˇ}{}=\{\alpha _0\stackrel{ˇ}{}`$ $`=`$ $`2(E_{1,1}E_{1,1})+2C,`$
$`\alpha _i\stackrel{ˇ}{}`$ $`=`$ $`E_{i,i}E_{i+1,i+1}E_{i,i}+E_{1i,1i},i\}.`$
The set of roots:

$$\mathrm{\Delta }=\{\pm \epsilon _0,\pm \epsilon _i,\pm \epsilon _i\pm \epsilon _j,ij,i,j\}.$$

The set of positive coroots is:

$`\mathrm{\Delta }_+\stackrel{ˇ}{}`$ $`=`$ $`\{\alpha _i\stackrel{ˇ}{}+\alpha _{i+1}\stackrel{ˇ}{}+\mathrm{}+\alpha _j\stackrel{ˇ}{},\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}0}ij\}`$
$``$ $`\{\alpha _0\stackrel{ˇ}{}+2\alpha _1\stackrel{ˇ}{}+\mathrm{}+2\alpha _i\stackrel{ˇ}{}+\alpha _{i+1}\stackrel{ˇ}{}+\mathrm{}+\alpha _{j1}\stackrel{ˇ}{},\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}1}i<j\}.`$
The set of simple roots:

$$\mathrm{\Pi }=\{\alpha _0=\epsilon _1,\alpha _i=\epsilon _i\epsilon _{i+1},i\}.$$

Here $`\epsilon _i`$ are viewed restricted to the restricted dual of the Cartan subalgebra of $`b_{\mathrm{}}`$, so that $`\epsilon _i=\epsilon _i`$. Given $`\lambda (b_{\mathrm{}})_0^{}`$, the labels and central charge are simply (in this case, we skip the superscript b)

$$\lambda _i=\lambda (E_{i,i}E_{i,i}),i>0,c=\lambda (C).$$

So that $`\lambda (\alpha _0\stackrel{ˇ}{})=2c2\lambda _1`$ and $`\lambda (\alpha _i\stackrel{ˇ}{})=\lambda _i\lambda _{i+1}`$ for $`i`$. Denote by $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_i`$ the i-th fundamental weight of $`b_{\mathrm{}}`$, namely $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_i(\alpha _j\stackrel{ˇ}{})=\delta _{i,j}`$.

Let $`P_+=\{\lambda (b_{\mathrm{}})_0^{}|\lambda ,\alpha _i\stackrel{ˇ}{}_+,\text{ for all }i_+\}`$ denote the set of dominant integral weights of $`b_{\mathrm{}}`$. Given $`\lambda P_+`$, we have $`\lambda =\mathrm{\Lambda }_{n_1}+\mathrm{\Lambda }_{n_2}+\mathrm{}+\mathrm{\Lambda }_{n_k}+h\mathrm{\Lambda }_0`$, $`n_1n_2\mathrm{}n_k1`$, $`h_+`$, and the module $`L(b_{\mathrm{}};\lambda )`$ has central charge $`c=k+h/2`$. Observe that the conjugate of the Young diagram corresponding to the partition $`(n_1,n_2,\mathrm{},n_k)`$ is $`(\lambda _1,\mathrm{},\lambda _{n_1})`$, and $`\lambda _i=0`$ for $`i>n_1`$. Note that $`n_1=n_1(\lambda )=\mathrm{max}\{i|\lambda ,\alpha _i\stackrel{ˇ}{}0\}`$. Observe that $`𝔰𝔬(2n_1+1)`$ may be viewed as a subalgebra of $`b_{\mathrm{}}`$ in a natural way, whose set of simple roots is $`\{\epsilon _1,\epsilon _1\epsilon _2,\mathrm{},\epsilon _{n_11}\epsilon _{n_1}\}`$. Denote by $`\overline{\lambda }`$ the dominant integral weight of $`𝔰𝔬(2n_1+1)`$ g! iven by $`\overline{\lambda }(2(E_{1,1}E_{1,1}))=2(c\lambda _1)`$ and $`\overline{\lambda }(E_{i,i}E_{i+1,i+1}E_{i,i}+E_{1i,1i})=\lambda _i\lambda _{i+1}`$ for $`1i<n_1`$. Denote by $`\overline{L}(\overline{\lambda })`$ the (irreducible) $`𝔰𝔬(2n_1+1)`$-submodule of $`L(b_{\mathrm{}};\lambda )`$ generated by its highest weight vector. It is, of course, isomorphic to the finite-dimensional irreducible $`𝔰𝔬(2n_1+1)`$-module associated to $`\overline{\lambda }`$, so that its $`q`$-character is a (well-known) polynomial in $`q`$.

###### Lemma 2.3.

Let $`\lambda P_+,n_1=n_1(\lambda )`$. Then

$`\mathrm{ch}_qL(b_{\mathrm{}};\lambda )=ch_q\overline{L}(\overline{\lambda }).{\displaystyle \underset{j=1}{\overset{n_1}{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{(1q^j)_q^{\lambda _{n_1j+1}}}}`$ . $`{\displaystyle \underset{i=1}{\overset{n_1}{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{(1q^{n_1+i})_q^{2c\lambda _i}}}`$
$`\times `$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{n_1i}{}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{(1q^{2i+1})_q^{2c}}},`$
where $`(1a)_q^m=(1a)(1qa)\mathrm{}(1q^{m1}a)`$.

###### Proof.

The proof is completely similar to the one of Lemma 2.1, using the data introduced above (cf. proof of Proposition 1.1 in ).

###### Theorem 2.4.

All non-trivial modules $`L(b_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]};\lambda )`$ have infinite growth.

###### Proof.

It is enough to consider the case $`m=0`$. Given $`\lambda (b_{\mathrm{}})_0^{}`$, we look at the subalgebra of $`b_{\mathrm{}}`$ isomorphic to $`g\mathrm{}_+\mathrm{}`$ spanned by all $`E_{i,j}E_{j,i}`$ with $`i,j1`$, and by Theorem 2.2, we conclude that $`L(b_{\mathrm{}};\lambda )`$ has infinite growth if $`\lambda _i\lambda _{i+1}_+`$ for some $`i1`$.

Let us assume $`\lambda _i\lambda _{i+1}_+`$ for all $`i1`$. If $`2c2\lambda _1_+`$, then $`(E_{1,0}E_{0,1})^Nv_\lambda 0`$ for each $`N_+`$. Looking at the subalgebra of $`b_{\mathrm{}}`$ isomorphic to $`g\mathrm{}_+\mathrm{}`$ previously defined, we conclude from Theorem 2.2 that

$$growthL(b_{\mathrm{}};\lambda )N+\underset{i1}{}\lambda _i.$$

If $`2c2\lambda _1_+`$, then by the same argument in the proof of Theorem 2.2, and looking at the last factor in Lemma 2.3, we conclude that $`L(b_{\mathrm{}};\lambda )`$ has the same growth as the polynomial algebra in infinitely many generators, finishing the proof.

### 2.3 Lie algebra $`c_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$

As before, we consider the vector space $`R_m[t,t^1]`$, and take the $`R_m`$-basis $`v_i=t^i,i`$. Denote by $`\overline{c}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$ the Lie subalgebra of $`\stackrel{~}{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$ which preserves the bilinear form:

$$C(u^mv_i,u^nv_j)=u^m(u^n)(1)^i\delta _{i,1j}.$$
(2.5)
We have

$$\overline{c}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}=\{(a_{ij}(u))_{i,j}\stackrel{~}{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}|a_{ij}(u)=(1)^{i+j+1}a_{1j,1i}(u)\}.$$

Denote by $`c_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}=\overline{c}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}R_m`$ the central extension of $`\overline{c}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$ given by the 2-cocycle defined in $`\stackrel{~}{g}\mathrm{}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$. This subalgebra inherits form $`\widehat{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$ the principal $``$-gradation and the triangular decomposition, (see  and  for notation)

$$c_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}=_j(c_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]})_jc_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}=(c_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]})_+(c_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]})_0(c_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]})_{}.$$

In particular when $`m=0`$, we have the usual Lie subalgebra of $`\widehat{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}`$, denoted by $`c_{\mathrm{}}`$ (see ).

Denote by $`L(c_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]};\lambda )`$ the highest weight module over $`c_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$ with highest weight $`\lambda (c_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]})_0^{}`$ parametrized by its labels $`{}_{}{}^{c}\stackrel{}{\lambda }(^{\mathrm{}})^{m+1}`$ and central charges $`\stackrel{}{c}^{m+1}`$, with

$`\stackrel{}{c}_i`$ $`=`$ $`\lambda (u^i),`$
$`{}_{}{}^{c}\stackrel{}{\lambda }_{j}^{(i)}`$ $`=`$ $`\lambda (u^iE_{j,j}(u)^iE_{1j,1j}).`$
Now, we are interested in representation theory of $`c_{\mathrm{}}`$.

The set of simple coroots of $`c_{\mathrm{}}`$, denoted by $`\mathrm{\Pi }\stackrel{ˇ}{}`$, can be described as follows (cf. ):

$`\mathrm{\Pi }\stackrel{ˇ}{}=\{\alpha _0\stackrel{ˇ}{}`$ $`=`$ $`E_{0,0}E_{1,1}+C,`$
$`\alpha _i\stackrel{ˇ}{}`$ $`=`$ $`E_{i,i}E_{i+1,i+1}+E_{i,i}E_{1i,1i},i\}.`$
The set of roots:

$$\mathrm{\Delta }=\{\pm 2\epsilon _i,\pm \epsilon _i\pm \epsilon _j,ij,i,j\}.$$

The set of positive coroots is:

$`\mathrm{\Delta }_+\stackrel{ˇ}{}`$ $`=`$ $`\{\alpha _i\stackrel{ˇ}{}+\alpha _{i+1}\stackrel{ˇ}{}+\mathrm{}+\alpha _j\stackrel{ˇ}{},\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}0}ij\}`$
$``$ $`\{2\alpha _0\stackrel{ˇ}{}+2\alpha _1\stackrel{ˇ}{}+\mathrm{}+2\alpha _i\stackrel{ˇ}{}+\alpha _{i+1}\stackrel{ˇ}{}+\mathrm{}+\alpha _j\stackrel{ˇ}{},\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}0}i<j\}.`$
The set of simple roots:

$$\mathrm{\Pi }=\{\alpha _0=2\epsilon _1,\alpha _i=\epsilon _i\epsilon _{i+1},i\}.$$

Here $`\epsilon _i`$ are viewed restricted to the restricted dual of the Cartan subalgebra of $`c_{\mathrm{}}`$, so that $`\epsilon _i=\epsilon _{1i}`$. Given $`\lambda (c_{\mathrm{}})_0^{}`$, the labels and central charge are simply (in this case, we skip the superscript c):

$$\lambda _j=\lambda (E_{j,j}E_{1j,1j}),j,c=\lambda (C).$$

So that $`\lambda (\alpha _0\stackrel{ˇ}{})=\lambda _1+c`$ and $`\lambda (\alpha _i\stackrel{ˇ}{})=\lambda _i\lambda _{i+1}`$ for $`i`$. Denote by $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_i`$ the i-th fundamental weight of $`b_{\mathrm{}}`$, namely $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_i(\alpha _j\stackrel{ˇ}{})=\delta _{i,j}`$.

Let $`P_+=\{\lambda (c_{\mathrm{}})_0^{}|\lambda ,\alpha _i\stackrel{ˇ}{}_+,\text{ for all }i_+\}`$ denote the set of dominant integral weights of $`c_{\mathrm{}}`$. Given $`\lambda P_+`$, we have $`\lambda =\mathrm{\Lambda }_{n_1}+\mathrm{\Lambda }_{n_2}+\mathrm{}+\mathrm{\Lambda }_{n_k}+h\mathrm{\Lambda }_0`$, $`n_1n_2\mathrm{}n_k1`$, $`h_+`$, and the module $`L(c_{\mathrm{}},\lambda )`$ has central charge $`c=k+h`$. Observe that the conjugate of the Young diagram corresponding to the partition $`(n_1,n_2,\mathrm{},n_k)`$ is $`(\lambda _1,\mathrm{},\lambda _{n_1})`$, and $`\lambda _i=0`$ for $`i>n_1`$. Note that $`n_1=n_1(\lambda )=\mathrm{max}\{i|\lambda ,\alpha _i\stackrel{ˇ}{}0\}`$. Observe that $`𝔰𝔭(2n_1)`$ may be viewed as a subalgebra of $`c_{\mathrm{}}`$ in a natural way, whose set of simple roots is $`\{2\epsilon _1,\epsilon _1\epsilon _2,\mathrm{},\epsilon _{n_11}\epsilon _{n_1}\}`$. Denote by $`\overline{\lambda }`$ the dominant integral weight of $`𝔰𝔭(2n_1)`$ given b! y $`\overline{\lambda }((E_{0,0}E_{1,1}))=c\lambda _1`$ and $`\overline{\lambda }(E_{i,i}E_{i+1,i+1}+E_{i,i}E_{1i,1i})=\lambda _i\lambda _{i+1}`$ for $`1i<n_1`$. Denote by $`\overline{L}(\overline{\lambda })`$ the (irreducible) $`𝔰𝔭(2n_1)`$-submodule of $`L(c_{\mathrm{}},\lambda )`$ generated by its highest weight vector. It is, of course, isomorphic to the finite-dimensional irreducible $`𝔰𝔭(2n_1)`$-module associated to $`\overline{\lambda }`$, so that its $`q`$-character is a (well-known) polynomial in $`q`$.

###### Lemma 2.5.

Let $`\lambda P_+,n_1=n_1(\lambda )`$. Then

$`\mathrm{ch}_qL(c_{\mathrm{}};\lambda )=ch_q\overline{L}(\overline{\lambda })`$ . $`{\displaystyle \underset{i=1}{\overset{n_1}{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{(1q^j)_q^{\lambda _{n_1j+1}}}}.{\displaystyle \underset{i=1}{\overset{n_1}{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{(1q^{n_1+i+3})_q^{2c\lambda _{i+1}}}}`$
$`\times `$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{(1q^{n_1+1})_q^c}}.{\displaystyle \underset{n_1i}{}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{(1q^{2i+3})_q^{2c}}},`$
where $`(1a)_q^m=(1a)(1qa)\mathrm{}(1q^{m1}a)`$.

###### Proof.

The proof is completely similar to the one of Lemma 2.1, using the data introduced above (cf. proof of Proposition 1.1 in ).

###### Theorem 2.6.

All non-trivial modules $`L(c_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]};\lambda )`$ have infinite growth.

###### Proof.

It is enough to consider the case $`m=0`$. Given $`\lambda (c_{\mathrm{}})_0^{}`$, we look at the subalgebra of $`c_{\mathrm{}}`$ isomorphic to $`g\mathrm{}_+\mathrm{}`$ spanned by all $`E_{i,j}E_{1j,1i}`$ with $`i,j1`$, and by Theorem 2.2, we conclude that $`L(c_{\mathrm{}},\lambda )`$ has infinite growth if $`\lambda _i\lambda _{i+1}_+`$ for some $`i1`$.

Let us assume $`\lambda _i\lambda _{i+1}_+`$ for all $`i1`$. If $`c\lambda _1_+`$, then $`(E_{1,0})^Nv_\lambda 0`$ for each $`N_+`$. Looking at the subalgebra of $`c_{\mathrm{}}`$ isomorphic to $`g\mathrm{}_+\mathrm{}`$ previously defined, we conclude from Theorem 2.2 that

$$growthL(c_{\mathrm{}},\lambda )N+\underset{i1}{}\lambda _i.$$

If $`c\lambda _1_+`$, then by the same argument in the proof of Theorem 2.2, and looking at the last factor in Lemma 2.3, we conclude that $`L(c_{\mathrm{}},\lambda )`$ has the same growth as the polynomial algebra in infinitely many generators, finishing the proof.

## 3 Irreducible finite growth $`gc_1`$-modules

We are interested in representation theory of the Lie algebra $`𝒟^{}`$ of regular differential operators on $``$. It consists of linear combinations of differential operators of the form $`f(t)\left(\frac{d}{dt}\right)^m`$, where $`f`$ is a polynomial and $`m_+`$. In particular, $`D=t\frac{d}{dt}𝒟^{}`$. The principal $``$-gradation $`𝒟^{}=_j𝒟_j^{}`$ is defined by letting

$$\mathrm{deg}t=1\mathrm{deg}\frac{d}{dt}=1.$$

Given a sequence of complex numbers $`\mathrm{\Delta }=(\mathrm{\Delta }_0,\mathrm{\Delta }_1,\mathrm{})`$ we define the highest weight module $`L(\mathrm{\Delta };𝒟^{})`$ over $`𝒟^{}`$ as the (unique) irreducible module that has a non-zero vector $`v_\mathrm{\Delta }`$ with the following properties:

$$𝒟_j^{}v_\mathrm{\Delta }=0\text{ for }j<0,D^nv_\mathrm{\Delta }=\mathrm{\Delta }_nv_\mathrm{\Delta }\text{ for }n_+.$$

The principal gradation of $`𝒟^{}`$ induces the principal gradation $`L(\mathrm{\Delta };𝒟^{})=_{j_+}L_j`$ such that $`L_0=v_\mathrm{\Delta }`$. The module $`L(\mathrm{\Delta };𝒟^{})`$ is called *quasifinite* if $`dimL_j<\mathrm{}`$ for all $`j_+`$.

Quasifinite modules over $`𝒟^{}`$ can be constructed as follows. Consider the natural action of $`𝒟^{}`$ on $`[t,t^1]`$ and choose the basis $`v_j=t^j(j)`$ of $`[t,t^1]`$. This gives an embedding of $`𝒟^{}`$ in $`\stackrel{~}{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}`$. Since $`[t]`$ is $`𝒟^{}`$-invariant, we get $`𝒟^{}`$-modules $`[t,t^1]/[t]`$ and $`[t]`$, which gives us an embedding of $`𝒟^{}`$ in $`\stackrel{~}{g\mathrm{}}_+\mathrm{}`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}`$, respectively, hence an embedding of $`𝒟^{}`$ in $`\stackrel{~}{g}\mathrm{}_+\mathrm{}\stackrel{~}{g}\mathrm{}_{\mathrm{}}`$. All these embeddings respect the principal gradations. Now take $`\lambda ^\pm ^\pm \mathrm{}`$ and consider the $`\stackrel{~}{g\mathrm{}}_+\mathrm{}\stackrel{~}{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}`$-module $`L^+(\lambda ^+)L^{}(\lambda ^{})`$. The same argument as in , gives us the following.

###### Lemma 3.1.

When restricted to $`𝒟^{}`$, the module $`L^+(\lambda ^+)L^{}(\lambda ^{})`$ remains irreducible.

It follows immediately that $`L^+(\lambda ^+)L^{}(\lambda ^{})`$ is an irreducible highest weight module over $`𝒟^{}`$, which is obviously quasifinite. It is easy to see that we have:

$`\mathrm{\Delta }_n`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{j1}{}}(j)^n\lambda _j^++{\displaystyle \underset{j0}{}}(j)^n\lambda _j^{},`$
so that
$`\mathrm{\Delta }(x):`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{n0}{}}\mathrm{\Delta }_nx^n/n!={\displaystyle \underset{j1}{}}\lambda _j^+e^{jx}+{\displaystyle \underset{j0}{}}\lambda _j^{}e^{jx}.`$
It is also clear that for $`\lambda ^\pm Par^\pm `$ we have (cf. Theorem 1a):

$$growthL^+(\lambda ^+)L^{}(\lambda ^{})=|\lambda ^+|+|\lambda ^{}|.$$

We shall prove the following theorem.

###### Theorem 3.2.

The $`𝒟^{}`$-modules $`L^+(\lambda ^+)L^{}(\lambda ^{})`$, where $`\lambda ^\pm Par^\pm `$, exhaust all quasifinite irreducible highest weight $`𝒟^{}`$-modules that have finite growth.

Let $`𝒟`$ denote the Lie algebra of all regular differential operators on $`^{}`$. The Lie algebra $`𝒟`$ is the linear span of differential operators $`f(t)\left({\displaystyle \frac{d}{dt}}\right)^k`$, where $`f(t)[t,t^1]`$ and $`k_+`$, or, equivalently of operators $`t^kf(D)`$, where $`f(D)[D]`$ and $`k`$. Obviously, $`𝒟^{}`$ is a subalgebra of $`𝒟`$, and the principal gradation extends from $`𝒟^{}`$ to $`𝒟`$ in the obvious way.

The basic idea of the proof of Theorem 3.2 is the same as in : to reduce the problem to the well developed (in ) representation theory of the universal central extension $`\widehat{𝒟}`$ of $`𝒟`$. Recall that the central extension $`\widehat{𝒟}=𝒟+C`$ is defined by the cocycle

$$\mathrm{\Psi }(f(t)\left(\frac{d}{dt}\right)^m,g(t)\left(\frac{d}{dt}\right)^n)=\mathrm{Res}_0dtf^{(n+1)}(t)g^{(m)}(t).$$
(3.1)
The principal gradation of $`𝒟`$ lifts to $`\widehat{𝒟}`$ by letting $`\mathrm{deg}C=0`$. Note also that the restriction of the cocycle $`\mathrm{\Psi }`$ to $`𝒟^{}`$ is zero.

For each $`s`$ one defines a Lie algebra homomorphism $`\phi _s:𝒟\stackrel{~}{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}`$ (via the action of $`𝒟`$ on $`t^s[t,t^1]`$) by

$$\phi _s(t^kf(D))=\underset{j}{}f(j+s)E_{jk,j}.$$
(3.2)
This homomorphism lifts to a homomorphism of central extension $`\widehat{\phi }_s:\widehat{𝒟}\widehat{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}`$ by

$`\widehat{\phi }_s(t^kf(D))`$ $`=`$ $`\phi _s(t^kf(D))\text{ if }k0,`$ (3.3)
$`\widehat{\phi }_s(e^xD)`$ $`=`$ $`\phi _s(e^{xD}){\displaystyle \frac{e^{sx}1}{e^x1}},\widehat{\phi }_s(C)=C.`$
More generally, for each $`m_+`$ one defines a homomorphism $`\phi _s^{[m]}:𝒟\stackrel{~}{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$ by

$$\phi _s^{[m]}(t^kf(D))=\underset{j}{}f(j+s+u)E_{jk,j}=\underset{i=0}{\overset{m}{}}\underset{j}{}\frac{f^{(i)}(j+s)}{i}u^iE_{jk,j},$$
(3.4)
which lifts to $`\widehat{\phi }_s^{[m]}:\widehat{𝒟}\widehat{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$ in a similar way. One of the main results of  is the following.

###### Lemma 3.3.

For each $`i=1,\mathrm{},r`$, pick a collection $`m_i_+`$, $`s_i`$, $`\stackrel{}{\lambda }_i(^{\mathrm{}})^{m_i+1}`$, $`\stackrel{}{c}_i^{m_i+1}`$, such that $`s_is_j`$ for $`ij`$. Then the $`_{i=1}^r\widehat{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m_i]}`$-module $`_{i=1}^rL^{[m_i]}(\stackrel{}{\lambda }_i,\stackrel{}{c}_i)`$ remains irreducible when restricted to $`\widehat{𝒟}`$ via the embedding $`_{i=1}^r\widehat{\phi }_{s_i}^{[m_i]}:\widehat{𝒟}_{i=1}^r\widehat{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m_i]}`$. All irreducible quasifinite highest weight $`\widehat{𝒟}`$-modules are obtained in this way.

###### Proof of Theorem 3.2.

Note that for $`j1`$ one has:

$$𝒟_j^{}=\{t^jf(D)|f(0)=f(1)=\mathrm{}=f(j1)=0\}.$$
(3.5)
Hence $`𝒟_j^{}`$ has finite codimension in $`𝒟_j`$ and therefore the quasifiniteness of a $`𝒟^{}`$-module $`L(\mathrm{\Delta };𝒟^{})`$ implies the quasifiniteness of any of the $`\widehat{𝒟}`$-modules $`L(\mathrm{\Delta },c;\widehat{𝒟})`$. Due to Lemma 3.3 , $`L(\mathrm{\Delta },c;\widehat{𝒟})`$ is a tensor product of the $`\widehat{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$-modules $`L^{[m]}(\stackrel{}{\lambda },\stackrel{}{c})`$ on which $`\widehat{𝒟}`$ acts via the embedding $`\widehat{\phi }_s^{[m]}`$ defined by (3.2) and (3.3).

It is clear from Theorem 2.2 that all non-trivial modules $`L^{[m]}(\stackrel{}{\lambda }_i,\stackrel{}{c}_i)`$ have infinite growth (by choosing an appropriate subalgebra isomorphic to $`g\mathrm{}_+\mathrm{}`$ in $`g\mathrm{}_{\mathrm{}}`$).

Recall that for any quasifinite $`\widehat{𝒟}`$-module one can extend the action of $`\widehat{𝒟}_j`$ for $`j0`$ to $`\widehat{𝒟}_j^𝒪`$, where $`𝒪`$ is the algebra of all holomorphic functions on $``$ , in other words, in (3.2) and (3.3) one can take any $`f𝒪`$ if $`j0`$. The same holds for $`𝒟^{}`$, except that for $`j1`$, $`f`$ must obey conditions in (3.5). We apply this to the $`\widehat{𝒟}`$-module $`L(\widehat{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]};\stackrel{}{\lambda },\stackrel{}{c})`$ on which $`\widehat{𝒟}`$ acts via $`\widehat{\phi }_s^{[m]}`$.

Choosing $`f𝒪`$ such that for all $`j`$:

$$f(j+s)=\delta _{rj},f^{(i)}(j+s)=0\text{ if }i=1,\mathrm{},m,$$

we see from (3.2) that all operators $`E_{r+1,r}`$ lie in the image of $`\widehat{\phi }_s^{[m]}(𝒟^𝒪)`$, except for $`E_{1,0}`$ when $`s=0`$ (here we use (3.5) for $`j=1`$). Hence, when restricted to $`𝒟^{}`$, the module $`L^{[m]}(\stackrel{}{\lambda },\stackrel{}{c})`$ remains irreducible, provided that $`s0`$. Thus, if $`L(\mathrm{\Delta };𝒟^{})`$ has finite growth, then $`L(\mathrm{\Delta };\widehat{𝒟})=L^{[m]}(\stackrel{}{\lambda },\stackrel{}{c})`$ on which $`\widehat{𝒟}`$ acts via the embedding $`\widehat{\phi }_0^{[m]}`$.

Choosing $`f𝒪`$ to vanish in all $`j`$ up to $`m`$$`^{\text{th}}`$ derivative except for $`i`$$`^{\text{th}}`$ derivative $`(0<im)`$ at $`j=r`$, we see that all operators $`u^iE_{r+1,r}`$ with $`0<im`$ lie in the image of $`\widehat{\phi }_s^{[m]}(𝒟^𝒪)`$.

Suppose that the $`m`$$`^{\text{th}}`$ coordinate of $`\stackrel{}{\lambda }_r`$ is non-zero, and that $`m>0`$. Then $`v:=(u^mE_{r+1,r})^Nv_\stackrel{}{\lambda }0`$ for all $`N>0`$. But

$$E_{rr}v=(N+\lambda _r^0)v,E_{r+1,r+1}v=(N+\lambda _{r+1}^0)v.$$

Therefore, restricting to the subalgebra of $`g\mathrm{}_{\mathrm{}}`$ consisting of matrices $`(a_{ij})_{i,jr}`$ or $`(a_{ij})_{i,jr+1}`$ we conclude by Theorem 2.2, that $`L(\widehat{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]};\stackrel{}{\lambda },\stackrel{}{c})`$ is either trivial or is of infinite growth.

Thus, the only possibility that remains is $`s=m=0`$. As has been already shown, the image of $`\widehat{\phi }_s(𝒟^𝒪)`$ contains all $`E_{r+1,r}`$ except for $`E_{1,0}`$, hence it contains all operators from $`g\mathrm{}_{\mathrm{}}g\mathrm{}_+\mathrm{}`$. Therefore, by Theorem 2.2 , the highest weight of a finite growth $`𝒟^{}`$-module must be the same as one of the $`𝒟^{}`$-modules $`L^+(\lambda ^+)L^{}(\lambda ^{})`$ with $`\lambda ^\pm Par^\pm `$.

Given two partitions $`\lambda ^\pm Par^\pm `$, we denote by $`L(\lambda ^+,\lambda ^{})`$ the $`𝒟^{}`$-module, obtained by restriction via $`\phi _0`$ from the $`\stackrel{~}{g\mathrm{}}_+\mathrm{}\stackrel{~}{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}`$-module$`L^+(\lambda ^+)L^{}(\lambda ^{})`$. Now we shall construct the $`𝒟^{}`$-modules $`L(\lambda ^+,\lambda ^{})`$ explicitly.

Consider the $`𝒟^{}`$-module $`[t,t^1]`$. Then $`[t]`$ is its maximal submodule (which is irreducible). Hence the $`𝒟^{}`$-module

$$V:=[t,t^1]/[t]$$
(3.6)
is irreducible. It is clear that this is the highest weight $`𝒟^{}`$-module of growth $`1`$ with a highest weight vector $`t^1+[t]`$. It is immediate to deduce that $`V`$ is isomorphic to $`L(\omega _1,0)`$ where $`\omega _1=(1,0,\mathrm{})Par^+`$.

Likewise, the $`𝒟^{}`$-module $`[t]^{}=_{j_+}(t^j)^{}`$ is an irreducible highest weight module of growth $`1`$ with a highest weight vector $`1^{}`$, hence it is isomorphic to $`L(0,\omega _1)`$, where $`\omega _1=(\mathrm{},0,1)Par^{}`$. We denote this $`𝒟^{}`$-module by $`V^{}`$.

As in the Schur-Weyl theory, the $`𝒟^{}`$-module $`T^M(V)T^N(V^{})`$ has a natural decomposition as $`(𝒟^{},S_M\times S_N)`$-modules:

$$T^M(V)T^N(V^{})=_{\begin{array}{c}\lambda ^\pm Par^\pm \\ |\lambda ^+|=M\\ |\lambda ^{}|=N\end{array}}(V_{\lambda ^+}V_\lambda ^{}^{})(U_{\lambda ^+}U_\lambda ^{})$$

where $`U_{\lambda ^+(\text{resp. }\lambda ^{})}`$ denotes the irreducible $`S_{M(\text{resp. }N)}`$-module corresponding to the partition $`\lambda ^+`$ (resp. $`\lambda ^{}`$).

###### Lemma 3.4.

The $`𝒟^{}`$-modules $`V_{\lambda ^+}V_\lambda ^{}^{}`$ are irreducible.

###### Proof.

As in the proof of Theorem 3.2, we extend the action of $`𝒟^{}`$ on $`V_{\lambda ^+}V_\lambda ^{}^{}`$ to $`𝒟_j^𝒪`$ for each $`j0`$, to obtain that any $`𝒟^{}`$-submodule of $`V_{\lambda ^+}V_\lambda ^{}^{}`$ is a submodule over $`g\mathrm{}_+\mathrm{}g\mathrm{}_{\mathrm{}}`$. But, by Schur–Weyl theory, the $`g\mathrm{}_+\mathrm{}g\mathrm{}_{\mathrm{}}`$-module $`V_{\lambda ^+}V_\lambda ^{}^{}`$ is irreducible, which completes the proof. ∎

Thus, we have proved

###### Theorem 3.5.

The $`𝒟^{}`$-module $`L(\lambda ^+,\lambda ^{})`$ is isomorphic to $`V_{\lambda ^+}V_\lambda ^{}^{}`$ for any pair $`\lambda ^\pm Par^\pm `$.

###### Remark.

Considering $`\lambda =(\lambda ^{},\lambda ^+)^{\mathrm{}}`$ we may say that irreducible highest weight $`𝒟^{}`$-modules of finite growth are parameterized by non-increasing sequences of integers $`(\lambda _j)_j^{\mathrm{}}`$ with the exception that $`\lambda _0\lambda _1`$. Equivalently, letting $`m_i=\lambda _i\lambda _{i+1}`$ we may say that these modules are parameterized by sequences of non-negative integers $`(m_i)_{i\backslash \{0\}}`$, all but finite numbers of which are zero.

Recall that the extended annihilation algebra $`Lie^{}(gc_1)`$ for $`gc_1`$ is isomorphic to the direct sum of the Lie algebra $`𝒟^{}`$ and the $`1`$-dimensional Lie algebra $`(+\frac{d}{dt})`$ and that conformal modules for a Lie conformal algebra coincide with the conformal modules over the associated extended annihilation algebra .

Given a module $`M`$ over a Lie conformal algebra $`R`$ and $`\alpha `$, we may construct the $`\alpha `$-twisted module $`M_\alpha `$ by replacing $``$ by $`+\alpha `$ in the formulas for action of $`R`$ on $`M`$. Theorems 3.2 and 3.5 and the above remarks imply

###### Theorem 3.6.

The $`gc_1`$-modules $`L(\lambda ^+,\lambda ^{})_\alpha `$, where $`\lambda ^\pm Par^\pm `$, $`\alpha `$, exhaust all irreducible conformal $`gc_1`$-modules of finite growth.

###### Corollary.

The $`gc_1`$-modules $`[]_\alpha `$ and $`[]_\alpha ^{}`$, where $`\alpha `$, exhaust all finite irreducible $`gc_1`$-modules.

###### Remark.

It is straightforward to generalize Theorems 3.2 and 3.5 to the case of $`N\times N`$ matrix differential operators and hence Theorem 3.6 to the case of $`gc_N`$. In particular the $`gc_N`$-modules $`[]_\alpha ^N`$ and $`([]^N)_\alpha `$ , where $`\alpha `$, exhaust all finite irreducible $`gc_N`$-modules. This is an result of Kac, Radul and Wakimoto. Moreover, these authors completely described all finite $`gc_N`$-modules, which amonted to prove a complete reducibility result for finite modules over the anninhilation algebra (see ). It is an open question whether a similar complete reducibility result holds in the case of finite growth modules

## 4 Irreducible finite growth $`gc_{1,x}`$-modules

The results of this section are almost the same as the previous one, as well as the proofs. Therefore, we will skip the details.

Let $`𝒟_0`$ (resp. $`𝒟_0^{}`$) be the Lie subalgebra of $`𝒟`$ (resp. $`𝒟^{}`$) of all regular differential operators on $`^{}`$ (resp. $``$) that kill constants. That is, $`𝒟_0`$ consists of linear combinations of elements of the form $`t^kDf(D)`$, where $`f`$ is a polynomial. Denote by $`\widehat{𝒟_0}`$ the corresponding central extension. These algebras inherits the $``$-gradation from $`\widehat{𝒟}`$.

In this section, we will need the representation theory of the Lie algebra $`𝒟_0^{}`$.

Given a sequence of complex numbers $`\mathrm{\Delta }=(\mathrm{\Delta }_1,\mathrm{\Delta }_2,\mathrm{})`$ we define the highest weight module $`L(\mathrm{\Delta };𝒟_0^{})`$ over $`𝒟_0^{}`$ as the (unique) irreducible module that has a non-zero vector $`v_\mathrm{\Delta }`$ with the following properties:

$$(𝒟_0^{})_jv_\mathrm{\Delta }=0\text{ for }j<0,D^nv_\mathrm{\Delta }=\mathrm{\Delta }_nv_\mathrm{\Delta }\text{ for }n.$$

The principal gradation of $`𝒟_0^{}`$ induces the principal gradation $`L(\mathrm{\Delta };𝒟_0^{})`$.

Quasifinite modules over $`𝒟_0^{}`$ can be constructed as follows. The $`𝒟_0^{}`$-modules $`[t,t^1]/[t]`$ and $`[t]/`$, give us an embedding of $`𝒟_0^{}`$ in $`\stackrel{~}{g\mathrm{}}_+\mathrm{}`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}`$, respectively, hence an embedding of $`𝒟_0^{}`$ in $`\stackrel{~}{g}\mathrm{}_+\mathrm{}\stackrel{~}{g}\mathrm{}_{\mathrm{}}`$. All these embeddings respect the principal gradations. Now take $`\lambda ^\pm ^\pm \mathrm{}`$ and consider the $`\stackrel{~}{g\mathrm{}}_+\mathrm{}\stackrel{~}{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}`$-module $`L^+(\lambda ^+)L^{}(\lambda ^{})`$.

The same argument as in , gives us the following.

###### Lemma 4.1.

When restricted to $`𝒟_0^{}`$, the module $`L^+(\lambda ^+)L^{}(\lambda ^{})`$ remains irreducible.

It follows immediately that $`L^+(\lambda ^+)L^{}(\lambda ^{})`$ is an irreducible highest weight module over $`𝒟_0^{}`$, which is obviously quasifinite.

We have the following theorem.

###### Theorem 4.2.

The $`𝒟_0^{}`$-modules $`L^+(\lambda ^+)L^{}(\lambda ^{})`$, where $`\lambda ^\pm Par^\pm `$, exhaust all quasifinite irreducible highest weight $`𝒟_0^{}`$-modules that have finite growth.

The proof of Theorem 4.2 is the same as Theorem 3.2, but in this case we reduce the problem to the representation theory of the universal central extension $`\widehat{𝒟_0}`$ of $`𝒟_0`$ that was developed in  and .

Let $`s`$ and denote by $`\widehat{gl}_{\mathrm{},s}^{[m]}`$ the Lie subalgebra of $`\widehat{gl}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$ generated by $`C`$ and $`\{u^lE_{ij}|0lm,is\text{ and }js\}`$. Observe that $`\widehat{gl}_{\mathrm{},s}^{[m]}`$ is naturally isomorphic to $`\widehat{gl}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$. Let $`p_s:\widehat{gl}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}\widehat{gl}_{\mathrm{},s}^{[m]}\widehat{gl}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$ be the projection map composed with this isomorphism. If $`s`$, we also denote by $`\widehat{\phi }_s^{[m]}`$ the homomorphism (3.4) restricted to $`\widehat{𝒟_0}`$. If $`s`$, we redefine $`\widehat{\phi }_s^{[m]}`$ by the homomorphism $`p_s\widehat{\phi }_s^{[m]}:\widehat{𝒟}_0\widehat{gl}_{\mathrm{},s}^{[m]}`$.

In this case, we should replace Lemma 3.3 by one of the results of  (see also ):

###### Lemma 4.3.

For each $`i=1,\mathrm{},r`$, pick a collection $`m_i_+`$, $`s_i`$, $`\stackrel{}{\lambda }_i(^{\mathrm{}})^{m_i+1}`$, $`\stackrel{}{c}_i^{m_i+1}`$, such that $`s_is_j`$ for $`ij`$. Then the $`_{i=1}^r\widehat{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m_i]}`$-module $`_{i=1}^rL^{[m_i]}(\stackrel{}{\lambda }_i,\stackrel{}{c}_i)`$ remains irreducible when restricted to $`\widehat{𝒟_0}`$ via the embedding $`_{i=1}^r\widehat{\phi }_{s_i}^{[m_i]}:\widehat{𝒟_0}_{i=1}^r\widehat{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m_i]}`$. All irreducible quasifinite highest weight $`\widehat{𝒟_0}`$-modules are obtained in this way.

###### Proof of Theorem 4.2.

The proof is the same as Theorem 3.2 but have to use Lemma 4.3, and in the case $`s=0`$ one should use the redefined $`\widehat{\phi }_0^{[m]}`$.

Given two partitions $`\lambda ^\pm Par^\pm `$, the $`𝒟^{}`$-module $`L(\lambda ^+,\lambda ^{})`$ that is obtained by restriction via $`\phi _0`$ from the $`\stackrel{~}{g\mathrm{}}_+\mathrm{}\stackrel{~}{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}`$-module$`L^+(\lambda ^+)L^{}(\lambda ^{})`$, remains irreducible as a $`𝒟_0^{}`$-module. The construction of the $`𝒟_0^{}`$-modules $`L(\lambda ^+,\lambda ^{})`$ is the same as before, and Lemma 3.4 and Theorem 3.5 holds for $`𝒟_0^{}`$.

In this case, the extended annihilation algebra $`Lie^{}(gc_{1,x})`$ for $`gc_{1,x}`$ is isomorphic to the direct sum of the Lie algebra $`𝒟_0^{}`$ and the $`1`$-dimensional Lie algebra $`(+\frac{d}{dt})`$. Theorems 4.2 and 3.5 and the above remarks imply

###### Theorem 4.4.

The $`gc_{1,x}`$-modules $`L(\lambda ^+,\lambda ^{})_\alpha `$, where $`\lambda ^\pm Par^\pm `$, $`\alpha `$, exhaust all irreducible conformal $`gc_{1,x}`$-modules of finite growth.

###### Corollary.

The $`gc_{1,x}`$-modules $`[]_\alpha `$ and $`[]_\alpha ^{}`$, where $`\alpha `$, exhaust all finite irreducible $`gc_{1,x}`$-modules.

## 5 Irreducible finite growth $`oc_1`$-modules

Now, consider the anti-involution $`\sigma `$ on $`𝒟`$ defined by (cf. )

$$\sigma (t)=t,\sigma \left(\frac{d}{dt}\right)=\frac{d}{dt}.$$

Denote by $`𝒟_\sigma `$ the fixed subalgebra of $`𝒟`$ by $`\sigma `$, namely: $`𝒟_\sigma =\{a𝒟|\sigma (a)=a\}`$. This subalgebra corresponds to the Lie algebra denoted by $`𝒟^+`$ in . Let $`\widehat{𝒟}_\sigma =𝒟_\sigma +C`$ denote the central extension given by the restriction of the cocycle (3.1) on $`𝒟`$.

We are interested in representation theory of the Lie subalgebra $`𝒟_\sigma ^{}=𝒟^{}\widehat{𝒟}_\sigma `$ of regular differential operators on $``$ that are invariant by $`\sigma `$. Both subalgebras inherit a $``$-gradation from $`𝒟`$, since $`\sigma `$ preserve the principal $``$-gradation of $`𝒟`$, and we have $`𝒟_\sigma =_j(𝒟_\sigma )_j`$, where

$$(𝒟_\sigma )_j=\{t^jg(D+(j+1)/2)|g(w)[w]\text{ is odd }\}.$$
(5.1)
In the case of $`(𝒟_\sigma ^{})_j`$, we need to add condition (3.5) for $`j<0`$.

Similarly, we have the corresponding subalgebras of $`𝒟^𝒪`$, denoted by $`𝒟_\sigma ^𝒪`$ and $`𝒟_\sigma ^𝒪`$.

As in the case of $`𝒟^{}`$, given a sequence of complex numbers $`\mathrm{\Delta }=\{\mathrm{\Delta }_n\}_{n_{odd}}`$, we define the highest weight module $`L(\mathrm{\Delta };𝒟_\sigma ^{})`$ over $`𝒟_\sigma ^{}`$ as the (unique) irreducible module that has a non-zero vector $`v_\mathrm{\Delta }`$ with the following properties:

$$(𝒟_\sigma ^{})_jv_\mathrm{\Delta }=0\text{ for }j<0,(D+1/2)^nv_\mathrm{\Delta }=\mathrm{\Delta }_nv_\mathrm{\Delta }\text{ for }n_{odd}.$$

The principal gradation of $`𝒟_\sigma ^{}`$ induces the principal gradation $`L(\mathrm{\Delta };𝒟_\sigma ^{})=_{j_+}L_j`$ such that $`L_0=v_\mathrm{\Delta }`$. The module $`L(\mathrm{\Delta };𝒟_\sigma ^{})`$ is called *quasifinite* if $`dimL_j<\mathrm{}`$ for all $`j_+`$.

Quasifinite modules over $`𝒟_\sigma ^{}`$ can be constructed as follows. The $`𝒟_\sigma ^{}`$-module $`[t,t^1]/[t]`$ gives us an embedding of $`𝒟_\sigma ^{}`$ in $`\stackrel{~}{g\mathrm{}}_+\mathrm{}`$. This embedding respect the principal gradations. Now take $`\lambda ^+^+\mathrm{}`$ and consider the $`\stackrel{~}{g\mathrm{}}_+\mathrm{}`$-module $`L^+(\lambda ^+)`$ introduced in (2.1). The same argument as in , gives us the following.

###### Lemma 5.1.

When restricted to $`𝒟_\sigma ^{}`$, the module $`L^+(\lambda ^+)`$ remains irreducible.

Therefor $`L^+(\lambda ^+)`$ is an irreducible quasifinite highest weight module over $`𝒟_\sigma ^{}`$, and it is easy to see that we have:

$`\mathrm{\Delta }_n`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{j1}{}}(j+1/2)^n\lambda _j^+,n_{odd},`$
so that
$`\mathrm{\Delta }(x):`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{n_{odd}}{}}\mathrm{\Delta }_nx^n/n!={\displaystyle \underset{j1}{}}\lambda _j^+\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}2}\mathrm{sinh}((j+1/2)x).`$
We shall prove the following theorem.

###### Theorem 5.2.

The $`𝒟_\sigma ^{}`$-modules $`L^+(\lambda ^+)`$, where $`\lambda ^+Par^+`$, exhaust all quasifinite irreducible highest weight $`𝒟_\sigma ^{}`$-modules that have finite growth.

The basic idea of the proof of Theorem 5.2 is the same as in Theorem 3.2: to reduce the problem to the well developed (in ) representation theory of the universal central extension $`\widehat{𝒟}_\sigma `$.

Recall that the homomorphism $`\widehat{\phi }_s^{[m]}:\widehat{𝒟}\widehat{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$ defined in (3.4) lift to a homomorphism $`\widehat{\phi }_s^{[m]}:\widehat{𝒟}^𝒪\widehat{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$. Now, the restriction $`\widehat{\phi }_s^{[m]}:\widehat{𝒟}_\sigma ^𝒪\widehat{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$ to $`\widehat{𝒟}_\sigma ^𝒪`$ is surjective iff $`s/2`$, and in the other cases, using (5.1), we have that (see  for details)

$$\widehat{\phi }_0^{[m]}:\widehat{𝒟}_\sigma ^𝒪d_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]},\widehat{\phi }_{1/2}^{[m]}:\widehat{𝒟}_\sigma ^𝒪b_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}$$
(5.2)
are surjective homomorphisms. Now, let us consider the restriction to $`𝒟_\sigma ^𝒪`$. Since the constrains given by (3.5) do not affect the case $`s0`$, we still have that $`\widehat{\phi }_s^{[m]}:𝒟_\sigma ^𝒪\widehat{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$ ($`s/2`$) and $`\widehat{\phi }_{1/2}^{[m]}:𝒟_\sigma ^𝒪b_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$ are surjective.

One of the main results of  is the following.

###### Lemma 5.3.

For each $`i=1,\mathrm{},r`$, pick a collection $`m_i_+`$, $`s_i`$, $`\stackrel{}{\lambda }_i(^{\mathrm{}})^{m_i+1}`$, $`\stackrel{}{c}_i^{m_i+1}`$, such that $`s_i`$ implies $`s_i=0`$, $`s_i\frac{1}{2}+`$ implies $`s_i=\frac{1}{2}`$, and $`s_is_j`$ for $`ij`$. Then the $`_{i=1}^r𝔤^{[m_i]}`$-module $`_{i=1}^rL(𝔤^{[m_i]};\stackrel{}{\lambda }_i,\stackrel{}{c}_i)`$ remains irreducible when restricted to $`\widehat{𝒟}_\sigma `$ via the embedding $`_{i=1}^r\widehat{\phi }_{s_i}^{[m_i]}:\widehat{𝒟}_\sigma _{i=1}^r𝔤^{[m_i]}`$, where $`𝔤^{[m_i]}=\widehat{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m_i]}`$ (resp. $`b_{\mathrm{}}^{[m_i]}`$ or $`d_{\mathrm{}}^{[m_i]}`$) if $`s_i/2`$ (resp. $`s_i=\frac{1}{2}`$ or $`s_i=0`$). All irreducible quasifinite highest weight $`\widehat{𝒟}_\sigma `$-modules are obtained in this way.

###### Proof of Theorem 5.2.

The proof is similar to that of Theorem 3.2. Due to Lemma 5.3, Theorem 2.4 and (5.2), it is easy to see that if $`L(\mathrm{\Delta };𝒟_\sigma ^{})`$ has finite growth, then $`L(\mathrm{\Delta };\widehat{𝒟}_\sigma )=L(d_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]};\stackrel{}{\lambda },\stackrel{}{c})`$ on which $`\widehat{𝒟}_\sigma `$ acts via the embedding $`\widehat{\phi }_0^{[m]}`$.

Choosing $`f𝒪_{odd}`$ to vanish in all $`j`$ up to $`m`$$`^{\text{th}}`$ derivative except for $`i`$$`^{\text{th}}`$ derivative $`(0<im)`$ at $`j=r`$, we see that all operators $`u^iE_{r+1,r}(u)^iE_{r+1,r}`$ with $`0<im`$ lie in the image of $`\widehat{\phi }_0^{[m]}(𝒟_\sigma ^𝒪)`$.

Suppose that the $`m`$$`^{\text{th}}`$ coordinate of $`\stackrel{}{\lambda }_r`$ is non-zero, and that $`m>0`$. Then $`v:=(u^mE_{r+1,r}(u)^iE_{r+1,r})^Nv_\stackrel{}{\lambda }0`$ for all $`N>0`$. But

$$E_{r+1,r+1}v=(N+\lambda _{r+1}^0)v.$$

As in Theorem 3.2, restricting to the subalgebra of $`d_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$ isomorphic to $`g\mathrm{}_+\mathrm{}`$ consisting of matrices $`(a_{i,j}a_{1j,1i})_{i,jr+1}`$ we conclude by Theorem 2.2, that $`L(d_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]};\stackrel{}{\lambda },\stackrel{}{c})`$ is either trivial or is of infinite growth.

Thus, the only possibility that remains is $`s=m=0`$. As has been already shown, the image of $`\widehat{\phi }_s(𝒟_\sigma ^𝒪)`$ contains all $`E_{r+1,r}E_{1r,r}`$ for all $`r0`$, hence it contains all operators from $`d_{\mathrm{}}\left(g\mathrm{}_{\mathrm{}}g\mathrm{}_+\mathrm{}\right)g\mathrm{}_+\mathrm{}`$. Therefore, by Theorem 2.2, the highest weight of a finite growth $`𝒟_\sigma ^{}`$-module must be the same as one of the $`𝒟_\sigma ^{}`$-modules $`L^+(\lambda ^+)`$ with $`\lambda ^+Par^+`$.

Now we shall construct the $`𝒟_\sigma ^{}`$-modules $`L^+(\lambda ^+)`$ explicitly. The $`𝒟^{}`$-module $`V=[t,t^1]/[t]`$ defined in (3.6), viewed as a $`𝒟_\sigma ^{}`$-module, remains irreducible. This is the highest weight $`𝒟_\sigma ^{}`$-module of growth $`1`$ isomorphic to $`L^+(\omega _1)`$ where $`\omega _1=(1,0,\mathrm{})Par^+`$.

Observe that the $`𝒟_\sigma ^{}`$-module $`[t]^{}=_{j_+}(t^j)^{}`$ is isomorphic to $`L^+(\omega _1)`$.

As in the Schur-Weyl theory, the $`𝒟_\sigma ^{}`$-module $`T^M(V)`$ has a natural decomposition as $`(𝒟_\sigma ^{},S_M)`$-modules:

$$T^M(V)=_{\begin{array}{c}\lambda ^+Par^+\\ |\lambda ^+|=M\end{array}}V_{\lambda ^+}U_{\lambda ^+}$$

where $`U_{\lambda ^+}`$ denotes the irreducible $`S_M`$-module corresponding to the partition $`\lambda ^+`$.

###### Lemma 5.4.

The $`𝒟_\sigma ^{}`$-modules $`V_{\lambda ^+}`$ are irreducible.

###### Proof.

As in the proof of Theorem 5.2, we extend the action of $`𝒟_\sigma ^{}`$ on $`V_{\lambda ^+}`$ to $`(𝒟_\sigma ^𝒪)_j`$ for each $`j0`$, to obtain that any $`𝒟_\sigma ^{}`$-submodule of $`V_{\lambda ^+}`$ is a submodule over $`g\mathrm{}_+\mathrm{}\left(d_{\mathrm{}}(g\mathrm{}_+\mathrm{}g\mathrm{}_{\mathrm{}})\right)`$. But, by Schur–Weyl theory, the $`g\mathrm{}_+\mathrm{}`$-module $`V_{\lambda ^+}`$ is irreducible, which completes the proof. ∎

Thus, we have proved

###### Theorem 5.5.

The $`𝒟_\sigma ^{}`$-module $`T^M(V)`$ has the following decomposition as $`(𝒟_\sigma ^{},S_M)`$-modules

$$T^M(V)=_{\begin{array}{c}\lambda ^+Par^+\\ |\lambda ^+|=M\end{array}}L^+(\lambda ^+)U_{\lambda ^+}$$

where $`U_{\lambda ^+}`$ denotes the irreducible $`S_M`$-module corresponding to the partition $`\lambda ^+`$.

###### Remark.

Considering $`\lambda ^+^+\mathrm{}`$ we may say that irreducible highest weight $`𝒟_\sigma ^{}`$-modules of finite growth are parameterized by non-increasing sequences of integers $`(\lambda _j)_j^+\mathrm{}`$. Equivalently, letting $`m_i=\lambda _i\lambda _{i+1}`$ we may say that these modules are parameterized by sequences of non-negative integers $`(m_i)_i`$, all but finite numbers of which are zero.

Recall that the extended annihilation algebra $`Lie^{}(oc_1)`$ for $`oc_1`$ is isomorphic to the direct sum of the Lie algebra $`𝒟_\sigma ^{}`$ and the $`1`$-dimensional Lie algebra $`(+\frac{d}{dt})`$ and that conformal modules for a Lie conformal algebra coincide with the conformal modules over the associated extended annihilation algebra .

Theorems 5.2 and the above remarks imply

###### Theorem 5.6.

The $`oc_1`$-modules $`L^+(\lambda ^+)_\alpha `$, where $`\lambda ^+Par^+`$, $`\alpha `$, exhaust all irreducible conformal $`oc_1`$-modules of finite growth.

###### Corollary.

The $`gc_1`$-modules $`L^+(\lambda ^+)`$, where $`\lambda ^+Par^+`$, remain irreducible when restricted to $`oc_1`$.

###### Corollary.

The $`oc_1`$-modules $`[]_\alpha `$, where $`\alpha `$, exhaust all finite irreducible $`oc_1`$-modules.

## 6 Irreducible finite growth $`spc_1`$-modules

Now, consider the anti-involution $`\overline{\sigma }`$ on $`𝒟_0`$ defined by

$$\overline{\sigma }(t^kDf(D))=t^kDf(Dk).$$

This anti-involution was studied by Bloch  in connection with the values of $`\zeta `$-function.

Denote by $`𝒟_{0,\overline{\sigma }}`$ the Lie subalgebra of $`𝒟_0`$ fixed by $`\overline{\sigma }`$. Let $`\widehat{𝒟}_{0,\overline{\sigma }}=𝒟_{0,\overline{\sigma }}+C`$ denote the central extension given by the restriction of the cocycle on $`𝒟`$.

We are interested in representation theory of the Lie subalgebra $`𝒟_{0,\overline{\sigma }}^{}=𝒟^{}\widehat{𝒟}_{0,\overline{\sigma }}`$ of regular differential operators on $``$ that kills constants and are invariant by $`\overline{\sigma }`$. Both subalgebras inherit a $``$-gradation from $`𝒟_0`$, since $`\overline{\sigma }`$ preserve the principal $``$-gradation of $`𝒟_0`$: $`𝒟_{0,\overline{\sigma }}=_j(𝒟_{0,\overline{\sigma }})_j`$, where

$$(𝒟_{0,\overline{\sigma }})_j=\{t^jDg(D+\frac{j}{2})|g(w)[w]\text{ is even }\}.$$
(6.1)
In the case of $`(𝒟_{0,\overline{\sigma }}^{})_j`$, we need to add condition (3.5) for $`j<0`$.

Similarly, we have the corresponding subalgebras of $`𝒟^𝒪`$, denoted by $`𝒟_{0,\overline{\sigma }}^𝒪`$ and $`𝒟_{0,\overline{\sigma }}^𝒪`$.

As in the case of $`𝒟^{}`$, given a sequence of complex numbers $`\mathrm{\Delta }=\{\mathrm{\Delta }_n\}_{n_{odd}}`$, we define the highest weight module $`L(\mathrm{\Delta };𝒟_{0,\overline{\sigma }}^{})`$ over $`𝒟_{0,\overline{\sigma }}^{}`$ as the (unique) irreducible module that has a non-zero vector $`v_\mathrm{\Delta }`$ with the following properties:

$$(𝒟_{0,\overline{\sigma }}^{})_jv_\mathrm{\Delta }=0\text{ for }j<0,D^nv_\mathrm{\Delta }=\mathrm{\Delta }_nv_\mathrm{\Delta }\text{ for }n_{odd}.$$

The principal gradation of $`𝒟_{0,\overline{\sigma }}^{}`$ induces the principal gradation $`L(\mathrm{\Delta };𝒟_{0,\overline{\sigma }}^{})=_{j_+}L_j`$ such that $`L_0=v_\mathrm{\Delta }`$. The module $`L(\mathrm{\Delta };𝒟_{0,\overline{\sigma }}^{})`$ is called *quasifinite* if $`dimL_j<\mathrm{}`$ for all $`j_+`$.

As in the previous section, the $`𝒟_{0,\overline{\sigma }}^{}`$-module $`[t,t^1]/[t]`$ gives us an embedding of $`𝒟_{0,\overline{\sigma }}^{}`$ in $`\stackrel{~}{g\mathrm{}}_+\mathrm{}`$. This embedding respect the principal gradations. Now take $`\lambda ^+^+\mathrm{}`$ and consider the $`\stackrel{~}{g\mathrm{}}_+\mathrm{}`$-module $`L^+(\lambda ^+)`$ introduced in (2.1). The same argument as in , gives us the following.

###### Lemma 6.1.

When restricted to $`𝒟_{0,\overline{\sigma }}^{}`$, the quasifinite module $`L^+(\lambda ^+)`$ remains irreducible.

We shall prove the following theorem.

###### Theorem 6.2.

The $`𝒟_{0,\overline{\sigma }}^{}`$-modules $`L^+(\lambda ^+)`$, where $`\lambda ^+Par^+`$, exhaust all quasifinite irreducible highest weight $`𝒟_{0,\overline{\sigma }}^{}`$-modules that have finite growth.

The basic idea of the proof of Theorem 6.2 is the same as in Theorem 3.2: to reduce the problem to the recently developed (in ) representation theory of the universal central extension $`\widehat{𝒟}_{0,\overline{\sigma }}`$.

Recall that the homomorphism $`\widehat{\phi }_s^{[m]}:\widehat{𝒟}\widehat{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$ defined in (3.4) lift to a homomorphism $`\widehat{\phi }_s^{[m]}:\widehat{𝒟}^𝒪\widehat{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$. Now, the restriction $`\widehat{\phi }_s^{[m]}:\widehat{𝒟}_{0,\overline{\sigma }}^𝒪\widehat{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$ to $`\widehat{𝒟}_{0,\overline{\sigma }}^𝒪`$ is surjective iff $`s/2`$, and in the other case, using (6.1), we have that (see \[BL\] for details)

$$\widehat{\phi }_s^{[m]}:\widehat{𝒟}_{0,\overline{\sigma }}^𝒪c_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]},s/2$$
(6.2)
is a surjective homomorphism. Now, let us consider the restriction to $`𝒟_{0,\overline{\sigma }}^𝒪`$. Since the constrains given by (3.5) do not affect the case $`s0`$, we still have that $`\widehat{\phi }_s^{[m]}:𝒟_{0,\overline{\sigma }}^𝒪\widehat{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$ ($`s/2`$) and $`\widehat{\phi }_{1/2}^{[m]}:𝒟_{0,\overline{\sigma }}^𝒪c_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$ are surjective.

One of the main results of  is the following.

###### Lemma 6.3.

For each $`i=1,\mathrm{},r`$, pick a collection $`m_i_+`$, $`s_i`$, $`\stackrel{}{\lambda }_i(^{\mathrm{}})^{m_i+1}`$, $`\stackrel{}{c}_i^{m_i+1}`$, such that $`s_i`$ implies $`s_i=0`$, $`s_i\frac{1}{2}+`$ implies $`s_i=\frac{1}{2}`$, and $`s_is_j`$ for $`ij`$. Then the $`_{i=1}^r𝔤^{[m_i]}`$-module $`_{i=1}^rL(𝔤^{[m_i]};\stackrel{}{\lambda }_i,\stackrel{}{c}_i)`$ remains irreducible when restricted to $`\widehat{𝒟}_{0,\overline{\sigma }}`$ via the embedding $`_{i=1}^r\widehat{\phi }_{s_i}^{[m_i]}:\widehat{𝒟}_{0,\overline{\sigma }}_{i=1}^r𝔤^{[m_i]}`$, where $`𝔤^{[m_i]}=\widehat{g\mathrm{}}_{\mathrm{}}^{[m_i]}`$ (resp. $`c_{\mathrm{}}^{[m_i]}`$) if $`s_i/2`$ (resp. $`s_i=\frac{1}{2}`$ or $`s_i=0`$). All irreducible quasifinite highest weight $`\widehat{𝒟}_{0,\overline{\sigma }}`$-modules are obtained in this way.

###### Proof of Theorem 6.2.

The proof is similar to that of Theorem 3.2. Due to Lemma 6.3, Theorem 2.6 and (6.2), it is easy to see that if $`L(\mathrm{\Delta };𝒟_{0,\overline{\sigma }}^{})`$ has finite growth, then $`L(\mathrm{\Delta };\widehat{𝒟}_{0,\overline{\sigma }})=L(c_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]};\stackrel{}{\lambda },\stackrel{}{c})`$ on which $`\widehat{𝒟}_{0,\overline{\sigma }}`$ acts via the embedding $`\widehat{\phi }_0^{[m]}`$.

Choosing $`f𝒪_{odd}`$ to vanish in all $`j`$ up to $`m`$$`^{\text{th}}`$ derivative except for $`i`$$`^{\text{th}}`$ derivative $`(0<im)`$ at $`j=r`$, we see that all operators $`u^iE_{r+1,r}+(u)^iE_{r+1,r}`$ with $`0<im`$ lie in the image of $`\widehat{\phi }_0^{[m]}(𝒟_{0,\overline{\sigma }}^𝒪)`$.

Suppose that the $`m`$$`^{\text{th}}`$ coordinate of $`\stackrel{}{\lambda }_r`$ is non-zero, and that $`m>0`$. Then $`v:=(u^mE_{r+1,r}+(u)^iE_{r+1,r})^Nv_\stackrel{}{\lambda }0`$ for all $`N>0`$. But

$$E_{r+1,r+1}v=(N+\lambda _{r+1}^0)v.$$

As in Theorem 3.2, restricting to the subalgebra of $`c_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]}`$ isomorphic to $`g\mathrm{}_+\mathrm{}`$ consisting of matrices $`(a_{i,j}(1)^{i+j}a_{1j,1i})_{i,jr+1}`$ we conclude by Theorem 2.2, that $`L(c_{\mathrm{}}^{[m]};\stackrel{}{\lambda },\stackrel{}{c})`$ is either trivial or is of infinite growth.

Thus, the only possibility that remains is $`s=m=0`$. As has been already shown, the image of $`\widehat{\phi }_s(𝒟_{0,\overline{\sigma }}^𝒪)`$ contains all $`E_{r+1,r}+E_{1r,r}`$ for all $`r0`$, hence it contains all operators from $`c_{\mathrm{}}\left(g\mathrm{}_{\mathrm{}}g\mathrm{}_+\mathrm{}\right)g\mathrm{}_+\mathrm{}`$. Therefore, by Theorem 2.2, the highest weight of a finite growth $`𝒟_{0,\overline{\sigma }}^{}`$-module must be the same as one of the $`𝒟_{0,\overline{\sigma }}^{}`$-modules $`L^+(\lambda ^+)`$ with $`\lambda ^+Par^+`$.

As in the previous section, we can construct the $`𝒟_{0,\overline{\sigma }}^{}`$-modules $`L^+(\lambda ^+)`$ explicitly. The $`𝒟^{}`$-module $`V=[t,t^1]/[t]`$ defined in (3.6), viewed as a $`𝒟_{0,\overline{\sigma }}^{}`$-module, remains irreducible. This is the highest weight $`𝒟_{0,\overline{\sigma }}^{}`$-module of growth $`1`$ isomorphic to $`L^+(\omega _1)`$ where $`\omega _1=(1,0,\mathrm{})Par^+`$.

Observe that the $`𝒟_{0,\overline{\sigma }}^{}`$-module $`[t]^{}=_{j_+}(t^j)^{}`$ is isomorphic to $`L^+(\omega _1)`$.

As in the Schur-Weyl theory, the $`𝒟_{0,\overline{\sigma }}^{}`$-module $`T^M(V)`$ has a natural decomposition as $`(𝒟_{0,\overline{\sigma }}^{},S_M)`$-modules:

$$T^M(V)=_{\begin{array}{c}\lambda ^+Par^+\\ |\lambda ^+|=M\end{array}}V_{\lambda ^+}U_{\lambda ^+}$$

where $`U_{\lambda ^+}`$ denotes the irreducible $`S_M`$-module corresponding to the partition $`\lambda ^+`$.

###### Lemma 6.4.

The $`𝒟_{0,\overline{\sigma }}^{}`$-modules $`V_{\lambda ^+}`$ are irreducible.

###### Proof.

As in the proof of Theorem 5.2, we extend the action of $`𝒟_{0,\overline{\sigma }}^{}`$ on $`V_{\lambda ^+}`$ to $`(𝒟_{0,\overline{\sigma }}^𝒪)_j`$ for each $`j0`$, to obtain that any $`𝒟_{0,\overline{\sigma }}^{}`$-submodule of $`V_{\lambda ^+}`$ is a submodule over $`g\mathrm{}_+\mathrm{}\left(c_{\mathrm{}}(g\mathrm{}_+\mathrm{}g\mathrm{}_{\mathrm{}})\right)`$. But, by Schur–Weyl theory, the $`g\mathrm{}_+\mathrm{}`$-module $`V_{\lambda ^+}`$ is irreducible, which completes the proof. ∎

Thus, we have proved

###### Theorem 6.5.

The $`𝒟_{0,\overline{\sigma }}^{}`$-module $`T^M(V)`$ has the following decomposition as $`(𝒟_{0,\overline{\sigma }}^{},S_M)`$-modules

$$T^M(V)=_{\begin{array}{c}\lambda ^+Par^+\\ |\lambda ^+|=M\end{array}}L^+(\lambda ^+)U_{\lambda ^+}$$

where $`U_{\lambda ^+}`$ denotes the irreducible $`S_M`$-module corresponding to the partition $`\lambda ^+`$.

Recall that the extended annihilation algebra $`Lie^{}(spc_1)`$ for $`spc_1`$ is isomorphic to the direct sum of the Lie algebra $`𝒟_{0,\overline{\sigma }}^{}`$ and the $`1`$-dimensional Lie algebra $`(+\frac{d}{dt})`$ and that conformal modules for a Lie conformal algebra coincide with the conformal modules over the associated extended annihilation algebra .

Theorems 6.2 and the above remarks imply

###### Theorem 6.6.

The $`spc_1`$-modules $`L^+(\lambda ^+)_\alpha `$, where $`\lambda ^+Par^+`$, $`\alpha `$, exhaust all irreducible conformal $`spc_1`$-modules of finite growth.

###### Corollary.

The $`gc_1`$-modules $`L^+(\lambda ^+)`$, where $`\lambda ^+Par^+`$, remain irreducible when restricted to $`spc_1`$.

###### Corollary.

The $`spc_1`$-modules $`[]_\alpha `$, where $`\alpha `$, exhaust all finite irreducible $`spc_1`$-modules.

Acknowledgment. C. Boyallian and J. Liberati were supported in part by Conicet, ANPCyT, Agencia Cba Ciencia, Secyt-UNC and Fomec (Argentina). Special thanks go to MSRI (Berkeley) for the hospitality during our stay there, where part of this work was done.


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# The invisible axion in a Randall-Sundrum universe

## I Introduction

One of the features which the Randall-Sundrum scenario rsa  shares with other solutions to the hierarchy problem is that it assumes a desert between the scale of electroweak physics and the scale of gravity. Although new phenomena—strong gravity and bulk Kaluza Klein modes—appear above the electroweak scale, all the physics in this scenario can be expressed in terms of these two scales. Such a picture is usually adequate since we have no direct evidence of phenomena between these energies. Yet in some cases we may wish to introduce some new physics whose dynamics occur at an intermediate scale. The difficulty in the Randall-Sundrum brane world is to understand how a scale can naturally arise, surviving in the low energy theory, that is not either of these two natural extremes.

A specific instance of where such an intermediate scale is needed occurs in the invisible axion solution to the strong CP problem strongCP . The vacuum structure of QCD combined with the CP violation in the weak interactions permits an interaction of the form

$$\overline{\theta }\frac{\alpha _s}{8\pi }\mathrm{Tr}[ϵ_{\mu \nu \lambda \rho }F^{\mu \nu }F^{\lambda \rho }]$$
(1)
where $`F^{\mu \nu }`$ is the QCD field strength. This interaction violates P and CP and is highly constrained by measurements of the neutron dipole moment which require $`\overline{\theta }10^9`$. As a free parameter, $`\overline{\theta }`$ must thus be finely tuned for an acceptable theory. Peccei and Quinn pq  showed that if $`\overline{\theta }`$ is promoted to a dynamical field $`a(x^\mu )`$ which is the Goldstone boson associated with a spontaneously broken global $`U(1)_{\mathrm{PQ}}`$ symmetry, then $`\overline{\theta }`$ is dynamically driven to zero. Although this field, the axion, is a Goldstone mode, it does acquire a mass of the order $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_{\mathrm{QCD}}^2/f`$ where $`f`$ is scale at which the $`U(1)_{\mathrm{PQ}}`$ breaking occurs. An $`f`$ of the order of the electroweak scale produces too massive an axion for experimental constraints.

An acceptable axion mass does occur when the $`U(1)_{\mathrm{PQ}}`$ breaks at some high scale $`f\mathrm{TeV}`$. From astrophysical observations, this scale should lie within the interval turner ; cosmological

$$10^{10}\mathrm{GeV}f10^{13}\mathrm{GeV}.$$
(2)
Since the invisible axion models do not address the hierarchy problem, they do not attempt to explain whether such a scale can arise naturally.

In the Randall-Sundrum scenario, the only natural scales are the bulk Planck mass, $`M_5`$, and the AdS curvature, $`k`$. Other, exponentially smaller scales do arise when the physics responsible for them is confined to a region at some distance from the UV brane. Although the mass scales for the fields confined to the IR brane are also of the order $`M_5`$, when the fields there are rescaled to remove red-shift factors introduced by the induced metric on the brane, the apparent mass scales on the IR brane can be naturally of the order of the electroweak scale. Goldberger and Wise gw  showed that the position of the IR brane relative to the UV brane can be stabilized—and thus the electroweak-gravity hierarchy—without finely tuning the parameters of the stabilization mechanism. The observed Planck mass in low energy, four dimensional effective theory, determined by $`M_4^2M_5^3/k`$, remains large.

In this article we shall use the invisible axion as a case study of how to introduce new intermediate scales into the Randall-Sundrum scenario. For this purpose it provides an ideal subject—the scale $`f`$ is experimentally constrained to not be that associated with either of the branes. These constraints arise, moreover, from low energy physics with respect to the electroweak scale so that bulk effects do not allow us to modify these bounds as in scenarios with large extra dimensions ddg . We shall see that adding a further brane in the bulk produces an experimentally reasonable value for $`f`$ without any new excessive fine-tunings.

The next section discusses the origin of the scale $`f`$ associated with the breaking of $`U(1)_{\mathrm{PQ}}`$ when the axion is the phase of a complex bulk scalar field. Section III discusses how the scale $`f`$ arises when a third brane is added to the bulk and analyzes the problem of stabilizing all the branes with a single real scalar field. In Section IV, we show that it is more difficult to generate an acceptable value for $`f`$ using a bulk potential for the complex field containing the axion. Section V concludes.

## II The invisible axion as a bulk field

The action for the original Randall-Sundrum model contains an Einstein-Hilbert term and cosmological constant for the bulk as well as tension terms for the branes

$`S_{\mathrm{RS}}`$ $`=`$ $`M_5^3{\displaystyle d^4x𝑑y\sqrt{g}\left[2\mathrm{\Lambda }+R\right]}`$
$`+M_5^3{\displaystyle _{\mathrm{UV}}}d^4x\sqrt{h_0}\left[2\sigma _0+4K_0\right]`$
$`+M_5^3{\displaystyle _{\mathrm{IR}}}d^4x\sqrt{h_1}\left[2\sigma _1+4K_1+M_5^3_{\mathrm{sm}}\right].`$
Here $`h_{0,1}`$ and $`K_{0,1}`$ are the determinant of the induced metric and the trace of the extrinsic curvature on the UV and IR branes. In terms of the AdS curvature $`k`$, the cosmological constant is $`\mathrm{\Lambda }=6k^2`$ and the brane tensions should be $`\sigma _0=\sigma _1=6k`$. $`_{\mathrm{sm}}`$ represents the standard model Lagrangian. The UV and IR branes are located at $`y=0`$ and $`y=\mathrm{\Delta }y`$ respectively.

To solve the strong CP problem in the low energy theory, we introduce a global $`U(1)_{\mathrm{PQ}}`$ symmetry under which the brane quark and Higgs fields transform non-trivially strongCP . Since the scale of Peccei-Quinn symmetry breaking does not lie near the scales associated with either brane, it is natural to attempt to break this symmetry through bulk dynamics. Thus, the axion will correspond to the phase of a bulk complex scalar field,

$$\sigma =\frac{\rho }{\sqrt{2}}e^{ia}.$$
(4)
The dynamics of this field will be determined by a $`U(1)_{\mathrm{PQ}}`$-symmetric potential,

$`S_\sigma `$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle d^4x𝑑y\sqrt{g}\left[_a\sigma ^{}^a\sigma V(\sigma ^{}\sigma )\right]}`$ (5)
$`+{\displaystyle _{\mathrm{UV}}}d^4x\sqrt{h_0}𝒱_0(\sigma ^{}\sigma )`$
$`+{\displaystyle _{\mathrm{IR}}}d^4x\sqrt{h_1}𝒱_1(\sigma ^{}\sigma ),`$
Here, as in Goldberger and Wise gw , the potentials on the branes will be used to fix the value of the field $`\rho `$ on the UV and IR branes to be respectively $`\rho _0M_5^{3/2}`$ and $`\rho _1M_5^{3/2}`$.

The form of the $`U(1)_{\mathrm{PQ}}`$ symmetry breaking due to the bulk potential $`V(\rho )`$ is quite different from the invisible axion solution in $`3+1`$ dimensions. A vacuum solution in which $`\rho =f`$ for the bulk theory would necessarily require some fine-tuning of the bulk potential to obtain a realistic $`f`$. Instead, $`\rho `$ can have some non-trivial dependence on the extra dimension which also breaks the $`U(1)_{\mathrm{PQ}}`$. In going to the low energy effective theory, integrating out the bulk field $`\rho `$ will induce a scale $`f`$ for the axion which plays the same role as the symmetry breaking scale in the 4d invisible axion models.

The field equations for the components of $`\sigma `$ are

$`^2a+{\displaystyle \frac{2}{\rho }}_a\rho ^aa`$ $`=`$ $`0`$
$`^2\rho {\displaystyle \frac{\delta V}{\delta \rho }}\rho _aa^aa`$ $`=`$ $`0.`$ (6)
The important dynamics of the axion occurs at energies well-below the TeV scale beyond which bulk effects become important. In this low energy regime, we shall neglect the higher-order Kaluza-Klein modes of the axion which, since it is a Goldstone mode, will have a massless mode which remains in the effective theory. Thus we shall consider only the lowest mode in the Kaluza-Klein tower, $`aa(x^\mu )`$. This situation differs greatly from a bulk axion in models with large, flat extra dimensions where the Kaluza-Klein modes of the axion are of the order of the inverse compactification radius and are important in the low energy ($``$ TeV) theory ddg . The field $`\rho `$ is not protected by any symmetry and its vacuum state is determined by the bulk potential $`V(\rho )`$ so we shall neglect any $`x^\mu `$-dependent fluctuations about the vacuum configuration, $`\rho =\rho (y)`$, as small in the effective theory,

$$\rho ^{\prime \prime }4k\rho ^{}\frac{\delta V}{\delta \rho }_\mu ^\mu a0.$$
(7)
The axion from this perspective becomes a massless field while the scalar field $`\rho `$ has its dynamics set by the scale of the bulk physics. At energies below a TeV, we can integrate out $`\rho (y)`$ to obtain an effective description of the axion dynamics,

$`S_\sigma `$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle d^4x\left[\frac{1}{2}\left(_0^{\mathrm{\Delta }y}𝑑y\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}2}e^{2ky}\rho ^2(y)\right)_\mu a^\mu a\right]}`$ (8)
$`=`$ $`{\displaystyle d^4x\left[\frac{1}{2}f^2_\mu a^\mu a+\mathrm{}\right]},`$
where we have defined

$$f^2_0^{\mathrm{\Delta }y}𝑑y\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}2}e^{2ky}\rho ^2(y)$$
(9)
which sets the scale associated with the axion by rescaling

$$a(x^\mu )\frac{a(x^\mu )}{f}.$$
(10)
After this rescaling, the axion has the proper dimensions for a scalar field in the 4d effective theory.

The remaining components needed to implement a solution to the the strong CP problem closely resemble those found in standard invisible axion models. Typically such models introduce heavy quarks which carry $`U(1)_{\mathrm{PQ}}`$ charge and couple to $`\sigma `$—KSVZ axions ksvz —or an extra Higgs doublet is added which couples to $`\sigma `$—DFSZ axions dfsz . To obtain the latter model within a Randall-Sundrum scenario, we add an interaction between a pair of brane Higgs doublets, $`\mathrm{\Phi }_1`$ and $`\mathrm{\Phi }_2`$, and the bulk complex field $`\sigma `$,

$$S_{\mathrm{int}}=_{\mathrm{IR}}d^4x\sqrt{h_1}\left[\kappa M_5^1ϵ_{ij}\mathrm{\Phi }_1^i\mathrm{\Phi }_2^j(\sigma ^{}(\mathrm{\Delta }y))^2+\text{h.c.}\right];$$
(11)
here we have extracted a factor of the Planck mass so that $`\kappa `$ is a dimensionless coupling. Using that on the IR brane, $`\sigma (\mathrm{\Delta }y)=\frac{1}{\sqrt{2}}\rho _1M_5^{3/2}e^{ia}`$, and rescaling the axion using Eq. (10) and the Higgs fields by $`\mathrm{\Phi }_{1,2}e^{k\mathrm{\Delta }y}\mathrm{\Phi }_{1,2}`$ so that they have canonically normalized kinetic terms, the leading behavior from Eq. (11) in the low energy limit is

$$S_{\mathrm{int}}=d^4x\left[\kappa _{\mathrm{eff}}ϵ_{ij}\mathrm{\Phi }_1^i\mathrm{\Phi }_2^je^{2ia/f}+\text{h.c.}\right],$$
(12)
where

$$\kappa _{\mathrm{eff}}\frac{1}{2}\kappa \rho _1^2(e^{k\mathrm{\Delta }y}M_5)^2𝒪(\mathrm{TeV}^2).$$
(13)
The standard model fields confined to the IR brane also have $`U(1)_{\mathrm{PQ}}`$ charges which we shall choose to be $`+\frac{1}{2}`$ for the right-handed fermions and $`\frac{1}{2}`$ for the left-handed $`SU(2)`$-doublet fermions. With these assignments, the Higgs fields have $`U(1)_{\mathrm{PQ}}`$ charges $`+1`$ so that Eq. (12) is an invariant interaction. The fact that the Higgs fields transform non-trivially under $`U(1)_{\mathrm{PQ}}`$ allows some of their degrees of freedom to mix with the massless mode in the effective theory that arises when we integrate out the extra dimension (8). At this point the theory is essentially indistinguishable from 4d invisible axion model.

## III An intermediate brane

The energy scale associated with the Standard Model fields remains naturally light since they are confined to the IR brane at which the redshift suppresses the strength gravity by an exponential factor. Similarly, the introduction of another brane, at some intermediate distance in the bulk, $`0<y_a<\mathrm{\Delta }y`$, will produce a new energy scale $`e^{ky_a}M_4`$. A simple mechanism for achieving a reasonable value for the axion scale occurs when the bulk complex scalar field is free with a mass of $`m_\rho `$. If the brane potentials mainly act to force $`\rho `$ to assume natural values on the intermediate and IR branes, $`\rho (y_a)=\rho _aM_5^{3/2}`$ and $`\rho (\mathrm{\Delta }y)=\rho _1M_5^{3/2}`$ respectively with $`\rho _a,\rho _1𝒪(1)`$, and to vanish on the UV brane, $`\rho (0)=0`$, then integrating over the bulk yields a scale

$$\frac{f}{M_4}\frac{\sqrt{2}(2+m_\rho ^2k^2)^{1/4}}{(3+m_\rho ^2k^2)^{1/2}}\rho _ae^{ky_a}.$$
(14)
Since we have assumed that the brane potentials in Eq. (5) are $`U(1)_{\mathrm{PQ}}`$ symmetric, as long as they are analytic functions of $`\rho `$, $`\rho =0`$ will be an extremum on the branes so we do not need to fine-tune $`\rho (0)=0`$ to be a minimum.

To generate the scale for the axion, the relative positions of all three branes must be stabilized. In this section we shall show how the introduction of a single real Goldberger-Wise gw  field stabilizes both radion degrees of freedom that correspond to the two independent distances between pairs of branes. For simplicity we shall neglect the effect of the bulk complex scalar $`\rho `$ when analyzing the brane stabilization.

Consider a bulk space-time in which the UV and IR branes reside as usual at the fixed points of the orbifold, $`y=0`$ and $`y=\mathrm{\Delta }y`$ respectively, while an intermediate brane partitions the bulk into two regions with cosmological constants $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_0=6k_0^2`$ ($`0yy_a`$) and $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_1=6k_1^2`$ ($`y_ay\mathrm{\Delta }y`$). Matching the induced metric on both sides of the axion brane, the bulk metric can be written in the form

$$ds^2=e^{2k_0y}\eta _{\mu \nu }dx^\mu dx^\nu +dy^2$$
(15)
for $`0yy_a`$ and

$$ds^2=e^{2k_1y}e^{2(k_0k_1)y_a}\eta _{\mu \nu }dx^\mu dx^\nu +dy^2$$
(16)
for $`y_ay\mathrm{\Delta }y`$. The Israel jump conditions across the branes require the UV, IR and axion branes to have tensions respectively of

$$\sigma _0=6k_0\sigma _1=6k_1\sigma _a=3(k_0k_1).$$
(17)
Note that when the cosmological constants are equal, $`k_0=k_1=k`$, the axion brane becomes a tensionless ‘probe’ brane. For simplicity, we shall consider this case in the following analysis.

Eq. (17) summarizes the three fine-tunings necessary for this model. One of these fine-tunings is equivalent to the vanishing of the cosmological constant in the low energy effective theory. As in the Randall-Sundrum scenario, we shall not attempt to resolve this fine-tuning. In a scenario with a further extra dimension, this vanishing can be reduced to the tuning of the initial conditions rather than a tuning of the parameters in the gravitational action warpRS .

The remaining two fine-tunings in Eq. (17) correspond to tuning the two potentials for the positions of the IR and axion brane, relative to the UV brane, to be flat. The introduction of a bulk scalar produces an effective potential, $`V_{\mathrm{eff}}(y_a,\mathrm{\Delta }y)`$, which breaks both of the symmetries associated with arbitrarily changing $`y_a`$ and $`\mathrm{\Delta }y`$.

Let us examine a single massive bulk scalar field,

$$S_\varphi =M_5^3d^5x\sqrt{g}\left[\frac{1}{2}_a\varphi ^a\varphi \frac{1}{2}m^2\varphi ^2\right]$$
(18)
with a mass $`m=k\sqrt{\nu ^24}`$; we also define $`\nu =2+ϵ`$. Note that we have extracted a factor of $`M_5^3`$ so that $`\varphi (y)`$ is dimensionless. As in the standard Goldberger-Wise mechanism, we assume that the actions on the three branes,

$`S_\varphi ^{\mathrm{brane}}`$ $`=`$ $`M_5^3{\displaystyle _{y=0}}d^4x\sqrt{h}\left[\lambda _0\left(\varphi ^2v_0^2\right)^2\right]`$ (19)
$`+M_5^3{\displaystyle _{y=y_a}}d^4x\sqrt{h}\left[\lambda _a\left(\varphi ^2v_a^2\right)^2\right]`$
$`+M_5^3{\displaystyle _{y=\mathrm{\Delta }y}}d^4x\sqrt{h}\left[\lambda _1\left(\varphi ^2v_1^2\right)^2\right]`$
essentially act to fix the value of the scalar field to be $`v_0`$, $`v_a`$ and $`v_1`$ on the UV, axion and IR branes respectively. $`h`$ represents the determinant of the induced metric on the appropriate brane.

The scalar field satisfies a Klein-Gordon equation in the bulk and its solution in each of the two bulk regions is

$$\varphi (y)=\{\begin{array}{cc}\varphi _0(y)\hfill & \text{for }0yy_a\hfill \\ \varphi _1(y)\hfill & \text{for }y_ay\mathrm{\Delta }y\hfill \end{array}$$
(20)
where

$`\varphi _0(y)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{v_0e^{(\nu 2)ky_a}v_a}{1e^{2\nu ky_a}}}e^{(\nu +2)k(yy_a)}`$
$`+{\displaystyle \frac{v_0v_ae^{(\nu +2)ky_a}}{1e^{2\nu ky_a}}}e^{(\nu 2)ky}`$
$`\varphi _1(y)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{v_ae^{(\nu 2)k(\mathrm{\Delta }yy_a)}v_1}{1e^{2\nu k(\mathrm{\Delta }yy_a)}}}e^{(\nu +2)k(y\mathrm{\Delta }y)}`$ (21)
$`+{\displaystyle \frac{v_av_1e^{(\nu +2)k(\mathrm{\Delta }yy_a)}}{1e^{2\nu k(\mathrm{\Delta }yy_a)}}}e^{(\nu 2)k(yy_a)}.`$
Integrating the scalar field action over the extra dimension produces an effective potential for $`y_a`$ and $`\mathrm{\Delta }y`$,

$$V_{\mathrm{eff}}(y_a,\mathrm{\Delta }y)=M_5^3𝑑ye^{4ky}\left[_a\varphi ^a\varphi +m^2\varphi ^2\right],$$
(22)
which becomes, in terms of $`z_ae^{ky_a}`$ and $`z_1e^{k\mathrm{\Delta }y}`$,

$`{\displaystyle \frac{V_{\mathrm{eff}}(z_a,z_1)}{kM_5^3}}`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{(v_0z_a^{\nu 2}v_a)^2}{1z_a^{2\nu }}}z_a^4(\nu +2)`$
$`+{\displaystyle \frac{(v_0v_az_a^{\nu +2})^2}{1z_a^{2\nu }}}(\nu 2)`$
$`+{\displaystyle \frac{(v_a(z_1/z_a)^{\nu 2}v_1)^2}{1(z_1/z_a)^{2\nu }}}z_1^4(\nu +2)`$
$`+{\displaystyle \frac{(v_av_1(z_1/z_a)^{\nu +2})^2}{1(z_1/z_a)^{2\nu }}}z_a^4(\nu 2).`$
If this potential is to stabilize both of the radion parameters, then $`z_a`$ and $`z_a`$ are set by

$`{\displaystyle \frac{V_{\mathrm{eff}}}{\mathrm{\Delta }y}}`$ $`=`$ $`kz_1{\displaystyle \frac{V_{\mathrm{eff}}}{z_1}}=0`$
$`{\displaystyle \frac{V_{\mathrm{eff}}}{y_a}}`$ $`=`$ $`kz_a{\displaystyle \frac{V_{\mathrm{eff}}}{z_a}}=0.`$ (24)
These first partial derivatives are

$`{\displaystyle \frac{z_a}{kM_5^3}}{\displaystyle \frac{V_{\mathrm{eff}}}{z_a}}`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{2z_a^4}{1z_a^{2\nu }}}\{(\nu ^24)z_a^{\nu 2}[v_0^2z_a^{\nu 2}2v_0v_a+v_a^2z_a^{\nu +2}]+2(\nu +2)[v_0z_a^{\nu 2}v_a]^2`$
$`+\nu (\nu +2)z_a^{2\nu }{\displaystyle \frac{\left[v_0z_a^{\nu 2}v_a\right]^2}{1z_a^{2\nu }}}+\nu (\nu 2)z_a^{2(\nu 2)}{\displaystyle \frac{\left[v_0v_az_a^{\nu +2}\right]^2}{1z_a^{2\nu }}}\}`$
$`{\displaystyle \frac{z_1}{kM_5^3}}{\displaystyle \frac{V_{\mathrm{eff}}}{z_1}}+{\displaystyle \frac{4z_a^4}{1(z_1/z_a)^{2\nu }}}\left\{(\nu +2)\left({\displaystyle \frac{z_1}{z_a}}\right)^4\left[v_a\left[{\displaystyle \frac{z_1}{z_a}}\right]^{\nu 2}v_1\right]^2+(\nu 2)\left[v_av_1\left[{\displaystyle \frac{z_1}{z_a}}\right]^{\nu +2}\right]^2\right\}`$
and

$`z_1{\displaystyle \frac{V_{\mathrm{eff}}}{z_1}}`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{2z_1^4}{1(z_1/z_a)^{2\nu }}}\{(\nu ^24)\left[{\displaystyle \frac{z_1}{z_a}}\right]^{\nu 2}[v_a^2\left[{\displaystyle \frac{z_1}{z_a}}\right]^{\nu 2}2v_av_1+v_1^2\left[{\displaystyle \frac{z_1}{z_a}}\right]^{\nu +2}]+2(\nu +2)[v_a\left[{\displaystyle \frac{z_1}{z_a}}\right]^{\nu 2}v_1]^2`$ (26)
$`+\nu (\nu +2)\left[{\displaystyle \frac{z_1}{z_a}}\right]^{2\nu }{\displaystyle \frac{\left[v_a(z_1/z_a)^{\nu 2}v_1\right]^2}{1(z_1/z_a)^{2\nu }}}+\nu (\nu 2)\left[{\displaystyle \frac{z_1}{z_a}}\right]^{2(\nu 2)}{\displaystyle \frac{\left[v_av_1(z_1/z_a)^{\nu +2}\right]^2}{1(z_1/z_a)^{2\nu }}}\}.`$
Both $`z_a`$ and $`z_1`$ are exponentially small so higher powers of these factors in Eqs. (III26) contribute negligibly. The structure of the matrix of second derivatives is such that as long as the intermediate brane is not too close to the UV brane, one eigenvalue will be of the order $`z_a^4`$ while the other will be of the order $`z_1^4`$. This structure breaks down when $`z_a^3z_1`$ in which case the smaller eigenvalue receives corrections of the order $`z_a^{12}z_1^4`$. For the scale required for the axion, the intermediate brane will be sufficiently far from the UV brane that we are well within the $`z_1z_a^3`$ regime. Retaining terms up to order $`z_1^4`$, we have

$`{\displaystyle \frac{z_a}{kM_5^3}}{\displaystyle \frac{V_{\mathrm{eff}}}{z_a}}`$ $`=`$ $`4(2+ϵ)z_a^4\left[(2+ϵ)v_0^2z_a^{2ϵ}(4+ϵ)v_0v_az_a^ϵ+2v_a^2\right]4ϵ(2+ϵ)r^4v_a\left[{\displaystyle \frac{z_1}{z_a}}\right]^ϵ\left[v_a\left[{\displaystyle \frac{z_1}{z_a}}\right]^ϵv_1\right]+𝒪(z_a^8,z_1^8).`$
$`{\displaystyle \frac{z_1}{kM_5^3}}{\displaystyle \frac{V_{\mathrm{eff}}}{z_1}}`$ $`=`$ $`4z_1^4\left[(2+ϵ)^2v_a^2\left[{\displaystyle \frac{z_1}{z_a}}\right]^{2ϵ}(2+ϵ)(4+ϵ)v_av_1\left[{\displaystyle \frac{z_1}{z_a}}\right]^ϵ+(4+ϵ)v_1^2\right]+𝒪(z_1^8)`$ (27)
The second equation determines the equilibrium distance between the intermediate and IR branes,

$$\left[\frac{z_1}{z_a}\right]^ϵ=\frac{1}{2(2+ϵ)}\frac{v_1}{v_a}\left[(4+ϵ)+\sqrt{ϵ(4+ϵ)}\right],$$
(28)
while the first equation, after using Eq. (28), determines the distance between the intermediate and UV branes,

$$z_a^ϵ=\frac{v_a}{v_0}\left[1+\frac{\sqrt{ϵ(4+ϵ)}}{(2+ϵ)^2}\left[\frac{z_1}{z_a}\right]^4\frac{v_1^2}{v_a^2}\right].$$
(29)
In Eqs. (2829) we have implicitly chosen the root which corresponds to a minimum in both the $`z_a`$ and $`z_1`$ directions. At these extrema, the second partial derivatives are, to leading order in $`ϵ`$ and in the small exponentials,

$`{\displaystyle \frac{^2V_{\mathrm{eff}}}{y_a^2}}`$ $`=`$ $`8ϵ^2v_a^2M_4^2e^{4ky_a}`$
$`{\displaystyle \frac{^2V_{\mathrm{eff}}}{\mathrm{\Delta }y^2}}`$ $`=`$ $`16ϵ^{3/2}v_1^2M_4^2e^{4k\mathrm{\Delta }y}`$
$`{\displaystyle \frac{^2V_{\mathrm{eff}}}{y_a\mathrm{\Delta }y}}`$ $`=`$ $`16ϵ^{3/2}v_1^2M_4^2e^{4k\mathrm{\Delta }y}.`$ (30)
The eigenvalues of this matrix of second derivatives are both positive,

$$8ϵ^2v_a^2M_4^2e^{4ky_a}\text{and}16ϵ^{3/2}v_1^2M_4^2e^{4k\mathrm{\Delta }y},$$
(31)
so the relative positions of the branes are stable.

The bulk complex scalar which contains the axion might disrupt the stabilization of the branes if it produces too large a contribution to the total effective potential. However, the contribution from the complex field will be negligible compared to that arising from integrating out the field $`\varphi `$ as long as $`v_0,v_a,v_1\rho _a,\rho _1`$.

### Multiple branes

In the preceding example with a single intermediate brane, we observed that for each brane we have one fine-tuning. Aside from the one fine-tuning for the effective cosmological constant at low energies, these fine-tunings can be interpreted as requiring the potentials for the radions—for the relative separations among the branes—to vanish. A single bulk scalar field was sufficient to break the flatness with respect to both independent interbrane distances. This technique can be extended to scenarios with multiple intermediate branes which could then have several large mass scales appearing in the low energy theory.

As an example, consider a theory with two intermediate branes at positions $`y=y_a`$ and $`y=y_b`$. Including a free massive scalar field in the bulk with potentials on these branes such that $`\varphi (y_a)=v_a`$ and $`\varphi (y_b)=v_b`$ but otherwise identical to the case above, we find that the branes are stabilized at

$$ky_a=\frac{1}{ϵ}\mathrm{ln}\left[\frac{v_0}{v_a}\right]\text{,}ky_b=\frac{1}{ϵ}\mathrm{ln}\left[\frac{v_0}{v_b}\right]$$
(32)
and

$$k\mathrm{\Delta }y=\frac{1}{ϵ}\mathrm{ln}\left[\frac{1}{2}\frac{1}{2+ϵ}\frac{v_1}{v_0}\left[4+ϵ+\sqrt{ϵ(4+ϵ)}\right]\right]$$
(33)
to leading order in powers of the small exponentials. The matrix of second derivatives for $`y_a`$, $`y_b`$ and $`\mathrm{\Delta }y`$ given by Eqs. (3233) has eigenvalues which are all positive,

$`\lambda _a`$ $``$ $`8ϵ^2v_a^2M_4^2e^{4ky_a}`$
$`\lambda _b`$ $``$ $`8ϵ^2v_b^2M_4^2e^{4ky_b}`$
$`\lambda _1`$ $``$ $`16ϵ^{3/2}v_1^2M_4^2e^{4k\mathrm{\Delta }y},`$ (34)
to leading order in $`ϵ`$. In deriving Eq. (34) we have assumed that the branes are sufficiently separated, $`e^{ky_b}e^{3ky_a}`$ and $`e^{k\mathrm{\Delta }y}e^{3ky_b}`$, for the eigenvalues to assume this form.

## IV Bulk potentials

While we can arrange for an invisible axion with the correct symmetry breaking scale $`f`$ without any unnatural constraints on the theory, it becomes more difficult to avoid some fine-tuning when we attempt to use a bulk potential to produce this behavior. In this section we shall determine how carefully we need to tune the form of simple potentials for the bulk complex field to produce a reasonable value for this scale.

As we saw for the inclusion of an intermediate brane, if $`\rho 1`$ until some intermediate position $`y_a`$, then the warping factor from the bulk metric yields $`fe^{ky_a}M_4`$. We can obtain some intuition as to the necessary form for the bulk potential by noting that the field equation for $`\rho `$,

$$\rho ^{\prime \prime }4k\rho ^{}=\frac{\delta V}{\delta \rho },$$
(35)
is that of a particle rolling in the inverted potential, $`V(\rho )`$, under the influence of a negative friction term. If the particle starts at $`\rho =0`$ with a small initial velocity, it tends to accelerate. Thus, in regions where the potential is approximately constant, its value will be exponentially larger after a finite interval or, conversely, throughout most of the interval $`\rho (y)`$ will be exponentially small. This evolution should not occur throughout the entire bulk since then the integral (9) would then only produce an $`fe^{k\mathrm{\Delta }y}M_4\mathrm{TeV}`$. If $`V(\rho )`$ decreases substantially after $`\rho `$ has become sufficiently large, this change will act to dissipate the ‘kinetic energy’ produced by the friction term and $`\rho `$ will grow more slowly so that $`\rho `$ is not exponentially weighted toward that latter end of this stage of its evolution in the bulk. After this dissipative stage, we could follow it with another region in which $`V(\rho )`$ is approximately flat—as long as $`\rho `$ does not grow exponentially larger than its values during the prior stage before it reaches the IR brane, the exponential factor in Eq. (9) insures that the integral will be dominated by intermediate values of $`y`$.

### IV.1 A free massive bulk field

The simplest potential is a mass term for the bulk scalar. From the preceding arguments, a positive mass squared term will have the effect of accelerating the growth of the field already produced by the friction term as we move from the UV to the IR brane. Although it might seem that a negative mass term could slow the effects of the friction term, we shall see that this case also does not produce an acceptable value for $`f`$ without some fine-tuning. Since the field equations for this potential can be solved exactly, we present both cases.

Consider a generalized mass term, to allow for either a stable or unstable extremum at $`\rho =0`$,

$$V(\rho )=\frac{1}{2}(\mu 4)k^2\rho ^2,$$
(36)
where $`\mu `$ is a dimensionless parameter. When $`\mu >0`$, the solution is

$$\rho (y)=\rho _1M_5^{3/2}\frac{e^{2ky}}{e^{2k\mathrm{\Delta }y}}\frac{\mathrm{sinh}(\sqrt{\mu }ky)}{\mathrm{sinh}(\sqrt{\mu }k\mathrm{\Delta }y)}$$
(37)
while for $`\mu <0`$,

$$\rho (y)=\rho _1M_5^{3/2}\frac{e^{2ky}}{e^{2k\mathrm{\Delta }y}}\frac{\mathrm{sin}(\sqrt{\mu }ky)}{\mathrm{sin}(\sqrt{\mu }k\mathrm{\Delta }y)}.$$
(38)
Here we have imposed the boundary conditions $`\rho (0)=0`$ and $`\rho (\mathrm{\Delta }y)=\rho _1`$. For $`\mu >0`$, the scale $`f`$ is always of the order

$$f/M_4\rho _1e^{k\mathrm{\Delta }y}$$
(39)
which is too small for $`\rho _1`$ of a natural size, $`𝒪(1)`$. In fact $`\rho _1`$ should be somewhat small if the presence of the scalar field is not to distort the background AdS<sub>5</sub> geometry. For $`\mu <0`$ the zeros of the denominator can generate much larger scales than (39); when $`\sqrt{\mu }k\mathrm{\Delta }y=n\pi \delta `$ ($`n=1,2,3,\mathrm{}`$),

$$f/M_4\rho _1\frac{\sqrt{\mu }}{\sqrt{1\mu }}\frac{e^{k\mathrm{\Delta }y}}{\delta },$$
(40)
but only if we finely tune $`\delta 10^6`$.

Note that in either case, if we relax the requirement $`\rho (0)=\rho _0=0`$ then $`\rho _0`$ must itself be tuned to be of the order $`10^6`$. In this case $`\mu `$ should also satisfy $`\mu >1`$ since otherwise the large negative mass squared favors an exponentially large value of $`\rho (y)`$ within the bulk so that we would find $`fM_4`$.

### IV.2 A potential well

The reason that a mass term alone does not succeed is that the potential contains no feature which might allow a brief growth of $`\rho (y)`$ which appears in the vicinity of $`0<y_a<\mathrm{\Delta }y`$ but which is damped soon after so that the field assumes an $`𝒪(1)`$ value at the IR brane.

To model this behavior with a potential which we can solve exactly, we shall study the following toy potential,

$$V(\rho (y))=\{\begin{array}{cc}V_0\hfill & \text{for }\rho \rho _a\hfill \\ V_0\left[1\frac{\rho (y)\rho (y_a)}{\mathrm{\Delta }\rho }\right]\hfill & \text{for }\rho _a\rho \rho _b\hfill \\ 0\hfill & \text{for }\rho \rho _b\hfill \end{array}$$
(41)
where

$$\mathrm{\Delta }\rho =\rho _b\rho _a.$$
(42)
The parameters specifying this potential are $`\rho _a`$, $`\rho _b`$ and $`V_0`$. We next shall estimate how carefully the form of the potential must be tuned to achieve an acceptable value for $`f`$.

Naïvely, (41) resembles a portion of a double well potential seen in the vicinity of the origin, as shown in Fig. 1, and we assume that $`V(\rho )=V(\rho )`$. Note that $`V(\rho )`$ could grow again for larger values of $`\rho `$, but as long as this growth occurs for values $`\rho (y)>\rho _1`$, it will not affect our derivation. Note also that we are implicitly assuming that $`\rho (y)`$ is a monotonically increasing function of $`y`$, which occurs provided the well is not so deep that all the ‘kinetic energy’ is dissipated and the particle rolls back toward $`\rho =0`$.

It is also important that $`\rho (0)=0`$ at the UV brane, which as in the intermediate brane case can be be arranged without any additional fine-tuning, since it is difficult for any natural potential to suppress it quickly enough to prevent the small $`y`$ region from dominating Eq. (9). We shall assume hereafter that $`\rho _0=0`$ and $`\rho _1𝒪(1)`$.

Let us define positions $`y_a<y_b`$ such that $`\rho (y_a)=\rho _a`$ and $`\rho (y_b)=\rho _b`$. The solution to Eq. (35) for this toy potential with the boundary conditions $`\rho (0)=0`$ and $`\rho (\mathrm{\Delta }y)=\rho _1`$ is then

$$\rho (y)=c\left(e^{4ky}1\right)$$
(43)
for $`0<y<y_a`$,

$`\rho (y)`$ $`=`$ $`c\left(e^{4ky}1\right){\displaystyle \frac{1}{16k^2}}{\displaystyle \frac{V_0}{\mathrm{\Delta }\rho }}\left(e^{4k(yy_a)}1\right)`$ (44)
$`+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{4k}}{\displaystyle \frac{V_0}{\mathrm{\Delta }\rho }}(yy_a)`$
for $`y_a<y<y_b`$ and

$`\rho (y)`$ $`=`$ $`c\left(e^{4ky}1\right){\displaystyle \frac{1}{16k^2}}{\displaystyle \frac{V_0}{\mathrm{\Delta }\rho }}\left(e^{4ky_a}e^{4ky_b}\right)e^{4ky}`$ (45)
$`+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{4k}}{\displaystyle \frac{V_0}{\mathrm{\Delta }\rho }}(y_by_a)`$
for $`y_b<y`$. For convenience we have defined the constant $`c`$ to be

$`c`$ $``$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{\rho _1M_5^{3/2}}{e^{4k\mathrm{\Delta }y}1}}+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{16k^2}}{\displaystyle \frac{V_0}{\mathrm{\Delta }\rho }}\left(e^{4ky_a}e^{4ky_b}\right){\displaystyle \frac{e^{4k\mathrm{\Delta }y}}{e^{4k\mathrm{\Delta }y}1}}`$ (46)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{4k}}{\displaystyle \frac{V_0}{\mathrm{\Delta }\rho }}{\displaystyle \frac{y_by_a}{e^{4k\mathrm{\Delta }y}1}}.`$
To learn whether the potential requires any fine-tunings, we can reparameterize the slope of the potential in terms of the natural scales available, $`k`$, $`M_5`$,

$$\frac{V_0}{\mathrm{\Delta }\rho }16k^2M_5^{3/2}\alpha $$
(47)
where $`\alpha `$ should be some constant of order one. To leading order in powers of the exponential factors, the integral (9) is then

$`f^2/M_4^2`$ $`=`$ $`\frac{40}{3}\alpha ^2e^{2ky_a}\frac{32}{3}\alpha ^2\left(1+3k(y_by_a)\right)e^{2ky_b}\frac{8}{3}\alpha ^2e^{2k(y_by_a)}e^{2ky_b}`$ (48)
$`+\frac{1}{3}\left(\rho _1^2+16\rho _1k(y_by_a)\alpha 128k^2(y_by_a)^2\alpha ^2\right)e^{2k\mathrm{\Delta }y}`$
$`\frac{8}{3}\alpha \left(\rho _14k(y_by_a)\alpha \right)\left(1e^{2k(y_by_a)}\right)e^{2k(\mathrm{\Delta }yy_b)}e^{2k\mathrm{\Delta }y}+\mathrm{}`$
For $`e^{ky_a}e^{ky_b}e^{k\mathrm{\Delta }y}`$ we have

$$\frac{f}{M_4}2\sqrt{\frac{10}{3}}\alpha e^{ky_a}.$$
(49)
The chief contribution to (9) comes from the region $`yy_a`$.

We can now show that to achieve a realistic value for $`y_a`$ requires finely tuning the potential. In terms of the parameters $`y_a,y_b`$ of the solution we have

$`\rho _aM_5^{3/2}`$ $`=`$ $`\alpha \left[1e^{4k(y_by_a)}\right]+\mathrm{}`$ (50)
$`\rho _bM_5^{3/2}`$ $`=`$ $`4k\alpha (y_by_a)`$
$`+e^{4k(\mathrm{\Delta }yy_b)}\left[\rho _14k\alpha (y_by_a)\right]+\mathrm{}.`$
Note that $`\rho _a`$, $`\rho _b`$ and $`\alpha `$ are the parameters specifying the shape of the potential. The first line in Eq. (50) indicates that we must tune $`\alpha ^1\rho _aM_5^{3/2}1`$ to within a fractional correction of the order $`e^{4k(y_by_a)}`$. We can evade this fine-tuning if $`y_by_a`$; however, then we must finely tune the value of $`\rho _b`$ to within an order $`e^{4k(\mathrm{\Delta }yy_b)}`$ correction. From Eq. (49) and Eq. (2), $`16ky_a23`$ and an electroweak-Planck hierarchy of $`10^{16}`$ requires $`k\mathrm{\Delta }y37`$. Assuming $`y_by_a`$ yields then an exponentially small correction.

## V Conclusions

The original Randall-Sundrum scenario contains only two, widely separated, energy scales associated respectively with the bulk and the IR brane physics. Since these scales could naturally be exponentially different, this model provides an attractive alternative explanation of the hierarchy between the gravitational and electroweak physics. In this article we have shown that other, intermediate scales can be incorporated into the Randall-Sundrum scenario, such as are needed for the invisible axion solution to the strong CP problem.

The basic requirement for generating a scale much lower than the Planck mass from a bulk field is to find a mechanism which excludes this field from the region near the UV brane. The introduction of an intermediate brane produces this behavior. When the potential on the UV brane causes the field to vanish there, most of the contribution to the effective symmetry breaking scale comes from the region between the intermediate and the IR brane. The position of the intermediate brane then determines the scale needed by the invisible axion. In this scenario, the $`U(1)_{\mathrm{PQ}}`$ symmetry breaking proceeds differently than in standard $`3+1`$ picture since it results from the non-trivial profile of the bulk complex scalar field whose phase is the axion.

A single additional scalar field is needed to stabilize the two independent distances between the pairs of branes. From a low energy perspective, this field produces an effective potential which breaks the necessity to tune the potentials for the two radion parameters to be flat. This stabilization only requires a very mild tuning to ensure that the complex scalar does not disrupt the mechanism. The resulting radions have masses of the order of the $`U(1)_{\mathrm{PQ}}`$ breaking scale and near the electroweak scale respectively.

While the invisible axion is not the only solution to the strong CP problem in extra dimensional scenarios—for example the QCD gauge fields could be promoted to bulk fields 5dqcd ; warp5dqcd —it provides an intriguing example of a warped geometry with multiple scales exponentially below the Planck mass. More generally, the existence of intermediate scales allows the possibility of a hidden sector which is naturally suppressed by a large, but not-Planckian, mass. It would also be interesting to understand the origin of multiple mass scales from the perspective of the AdS/CFT correspondence malda .

###### Acknowledgements.

This work was supported in part by DOE grant DE-FG03-91-ER40682.