Understanding fermionic generalized symmetries

We explore new aspects of internal fermionic shifting symmetries, present in physical systems such as free Dirac spinors and <a:math xmlns:a="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" display="inline"><a:mi>p</a:mi></a:math>-form tensor-spinor fields. We propose a novel procedure to gauge these global symmetries, which also introduces a new Stückelberg mechanism to give a mass to free fermionic fields. Furthermore, we find new magnetic fermionic symmetries in these physical systems whose charged objects are disorder operators. For the case of a 4D Dirac spinor, we discuss a dual description, where the magnetic symmetry acts on the holonomies of a dual 2-form tensor-spinor. Further generalizations such as higher-group-like structures are also discussed. Published by the American Physical Society 2024