Gauge field localization on Abelian vortices in six dimensions

The vector and tensor fluctuations of vortices localizing gravity in the context of the six-dimensional Abelian Higgs model are studied. These stringlike solutions break spontaneously six-dimensional Poincare invariance leading to a finite four-dimensional Planck mass and to a regular geometry both in the bulk and on the core of the vortex. While the tensor modes of the metric are decoupled and exhibit a normalizable zero mode, the vector fluctuations, present in the gauge sector of the theory, are naturally coupled to the graviphoton fields associated with the vector perturbations of the warped geometry. Using the invariance under infinitesimal diffeomorphisms, it is found that the zero modes of the graviphoton fields are never localized. On the contrary, the fluctuations of the Abelian gauge field itself admit a normalizable zero mode.