Massive Type IIA Supergravity and E10

Journal article, 2009

In this talk we investigate the symmetry under E10 of Romans' massive type IIA supergravity. We show that the dynamics of a spinning particle in a non-linear sigma model on the coset space E10/K(E10) reproduces the bosonic and fermionic dynamics of massive IIA supergravity, in the standard truncation. In particular, we identify Romans' mass with a generator of E10 that is beyond the realm of the generators of E10 considered in the eleven-dimensional analysis, but using the same, underformed sigma model. As a consequence, this work provides a dynamical unification of the massless and massive versions of type IIA supergravity inside E10.