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Sandwich construction of symmetry topological field theories for the center symmetries of Chern-Simons, Yang-Mills, and Einstein gravity

Leron Borsten1,2,*, Dimitri Kanakaris1,†, and Hyungrok Kim1,‡

  • *Contact author: l.borsten@herts.ac.uk
  • †Contact author: d.kanakaris-decavel@herts.ac.uk
  • ‡Contact author: h.kim2@herts.ac.uk
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Phys. Rev. D 113, 125027 – Published 22 June, 2026

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/4dxd-kh1r

Abstract

We construct symmetry topological field theories using the sandwich construction of Pulmann-Ševera-Valach that manifest the center symmetries of Chern-Simons theory and Yang-Mills theory as well as general relativity in the MacDowell-Mansouri formulation. The “filling” of the sandwich is an Alexandrov-Kontsevich-Schwarz-Zaboronsky sigma model whose target space is a Weil algebra, augmented with discrete degrees of freedom given by a choice of topological boundary condition.

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Phys. Rev. D 113, 125027– Published 22 June, 2026
  • Received 21 November 2025
  • Accepted 24 March 2026
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