Torsion parallel spinors on Lorentzian four-manifolds and supersymmetric evolution flows on bundle gerbes

Abstract: In this dissertation, parallel spinors on oriented and spin Lorentzian four-manifolds are investigated using the theory of spinorial polyforms. The main applications are directed towards the study of torsion parallel spinors and the globally hyperbolic solutions of the four-dimensional supersymmetric NS-NS system. This differential system, which originates in supergravity, involves torsion parallel spinors subject to a curvature condition and provides a natural gauge-theoretic interpretation of skew-symmetric torsion as the curvature of a curving on an abelian bundle gerbe, a natural categorification of the notion of principal circle bundle.