Chiral symmetry and Atiyah-Patodi-Singer index theorem for staggered fermions

Abstract: We consider the Atiyah-Patodi-Singer (APS) index theorem corresponding to the chiral symmetry of a continuum formulation of staggered fermions called K\"ahler-Dirac fermions, which have been recently investigated as an ingredient in lattice constructions of chiral gauge theories. We point out that there are two notions of chiral symmetry for K\"ahler-Dirac fermions, both having a mixed perturbative anomaly with gravity leading to index theorems on closed manifolds. By formulating these theories on a manifold with boundary, we find the APS index theorems corresponding to each of these symmetries, necessary for a complete picture of anomaly inflow, using a recently discovered physics-motivated proof. We comment on a fundamental difference between the nature of these two symmetries by showing that a sensible local, symmetric boundary condition only exists for one of the two symmetries. This sheds light on how these symmetries behave under lattice discretization, and in particular on their use for recent symmetric-mass generation proposals.