From Frame Covariance to the Swampland Distance Conjecture

Fuente: arXiv
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Auteurs principaux: Karamitsos, Sotirios, Muntz, Benjamin
Format: Preprint
Publié: 2025
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author Karamitsos, Sotirios
Muntz, Benjamin
author_facet Karamitsos, Sotirios
Muntz, Benjamin
contents Field space geometry plays a central role within the Swampland Programme, most notably in the various Distance Conjectures. However, for gravitational EFTs, this geometry is not uniquely defined: one can cast the action in many synonymous descriptions related by Weyl transformations, in which the field space metric transforms non-trivially across conformal frames. This raises a crucial question of how we are meant to think of the field space metric in view of employing the Swampland Conjectures. In this work we resolve this ambiguity by developing a fully frame-covariant framework for studying gravitational EFTs. We show that all conformal frames arise as distinct foliations of a singular higher-dimensional auxiliary geometry. Applying ADM formalism to the augmented field space, it is clear how Weyl- and unit transformations can be understood from a geometric point of view. Using this framework, we revisit the Species Scale Distance Conjecture and Sharpened Distance Conjecture, and show how the bounds derive from universal properties of gravitational EFTs under Weyl transformations. This strongly suggests that aspects of these conjectures apply to a much broader class of scalar-tensor theories and are consequences of frame covariance, rather than constraints imposed by quantum gravity.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2512_07929
institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle From Frame Covariance to the Swampland Distance Conjecture
Karamitsos, Sotirios
Muntz, Benjamin
High Energy Physics - Theory
General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology
Field space geometry plays a central role within the Swampland Programme, most notably in the various Distance Conjectures. However, for gravitational EFTs, this geometry is not uniquely defined: one can cast the action in many synonymous descriptions related by Weyl transformations, in which the field space metric transforms non-trivially across conformal frames. This raises a crucial question of how we are meant to think of the field space metric in view of employing the Swampland Conjectures. In this work we resolve this ambiguity by developing a fully frame-covariant framework for studying gravitational EFTs. We show that all conformal frames arise as distinct foliations of a singular higher-dimensional auxiliary geometry. Applying ADM formalism to the augmented field space, it is clear how Weyl- and unit transformations can be understood from a geometric point of view. Using this framework, we revisit the Species Scale Distance Conjecture and Sharpened Distance Conjecture, and show how the bounds derive from universal properties of gravitational EFTs under Weyl transformations. This strongly suggests that aspects of these conjectures apply to a much broader class of scalar-tensor theories and are consequences of frame covariance, rather than constraints imposed by quantum gravity.
title From Frame Covariance to the Swampland Distance Conjecture
topic High Energy Physics - Theory
General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2512.07929