When rational sections become cyclic — Gauge enhancement in F-theory via Mordell-Weil torsion

Abstract We explore novel gauge enhancements from abelian to non-simply-connected gauge groups in F-theory. To this end we consider complex structure deformations of elliptic fibrations with a Mordell-Weil group of rank one and identify the conditions under which the generating section becomes torsional. For the specific case of ℤ2 torsion we construct the generic solution to these conditions and show that the associated F-theory compactification exhibits the global gauge group [SU(2) × SU(4)]/ℤ2 × SU(2). The subsolution with gauge group SU(2)/ℤ2 × SU(2), for which we provide a global resolution, is related by a further complex structure deformation to a genus-one fibration with a bisection whose Jacobian has a ℤ2 torsional section. While an analysis of the spectrum on the Jacobian fibration reveals an SU(2)/ℤ2 × ℤ2 gauge theory, reproducing this result from the bisection geometry raises some conceptual puzzles about F-theory on genus-one fibrations