arXiv subjects
Publications and source records attributed to Oren Bergman.
We compute the potential for localized closed string tachyons in bosonic string theory on the orbifold C/Z_4 using level-truncated closed string field theory. The critical points of the potential exhibit features which agree with their conjectured identification as lower-order orbifolds. However this case also raises some questions regarding the quantitative predictions associated with these conjectures.
We study systems with a large number of meta-stable Dp-branes, and show that they describe Schwarzschild and Schwarzschild-like black branes, generalizing the results of Danielsson, Guijosa and Kruczenski. The systems are considered in both the open and closed string pictures. We identify the horizon size and its relation to the physics of open and closed strings. From the closed string perspective the region inside the horizon is where the effects of massive closed strings become important.
Extending the work of Gaiotto, Itzhaki and Rastelli in hep-th/0304192, we derive a general prescription for computing amplitudes involving a periodic array of D-branes in imaginary time to arbitrary order. We use this prescription to show that closed string amplitudes with b boundaries are identical to closed string amplitudes with b additional insertions of a particular physical closed string state. We perform an explicit computation for the annulus, and argue on the basis of open and closed string field theory for higher order amplitudes. We also discuss possible subtleties in the prescription related to collisions of boundaries and insertions, and argue that they are harmless. This verifies the proposal that a periodic array of D-branes in imaginary time corresponds to a pure closed string background.
In certain backgrounds string theory exhibits quantum Hall-like behavior. These backgrounds provide an explicit realization of the effective non-commutative gauge theory description of the fractional quantum Hall effect (FQHE), and of the corresponding large N matrix model. I review results on the string theory realization of the two-dimensional fractional quantum Hall fluid (FQHF), and describe new results on the stringy description of higher-dimensional analogs.
We classify the possible bosonic and Type 0 unoriented string theories in two dimensions, and find their dual matrix(-vector) models. There are no RP^2 R-R tadpoles in any of the models, but many of them possess a massless tachyon tadpole. Thus all the models we find are consistent two-dimensional string vacua, but some get quantum corrections to their classical tachyon background. Where possible, we solve the tadpole cancellation condition, and find all the tachyon tadpole-free theories.
The cylinder diagrams that determine the static interactions between pairs of Dp-branes in the type IIB plane wave background are evaluated. The resulting expressions are elegant generalizations of the flat-space formulae that depend on the value of the Ramond-Ramond flux of the background in a non-trivial manner. The closed-string and open-string descriptions consistently transform into each other under a modular transformation only when each of the interacting D-branes separately preserves half the supersymmetries. These results are derived for configurations of euclidean signature D(p+1)-instantons but also generalize to lorentzian signature Dp-branes.
The orbifold lines IIA/I_8 and IIB/$I_8 (-1)^{F_L} possess BPS discrete torsion variants which carry fundamental string (NSNS) charge. We show that these variants are actually classified by an integral electric field F from the twisted RR sector, and compute their tension and NSNS charge as a function of F. The analysis employs equivariant K-theory and the string creation phenomenon. The K-theory results demonstrate the corrections to cohomology in the case of torsion; it is found that 8 units of F are invisible at transverse infinity for IIA, and correspondingly 16 units for IIB.
A non-perturbative confinement mechanism has been proposed to explain the fate of the unbroken gauge group on the world-volume of annihilating D-brane-anti-D-brane pairs. In this paper, we examine this phenomenon closely from several different perspectives. Existence of the confinement mechanism is most easily seen by noticing that the fundamental string emerges as the confined electric flux string at the end of the annihilation process. After reviewing the confinement proposal in general, this is shown explicitly in the D2-anti-D2 case in the M-theory limit. Finally, we address the crucial issue of whether and how confinement occurs in the weakly coupled limit of string theory.
A brief introduction to the boundary state approach to Dirichlet branes is given. The example of the non-BPS D-string of Type IIA on K3 is analysed in some detail, and its dual heterotic state is identified.
It is shown that supersymmetry is spontaneously broken in certain three-dimensional supersymmetric gauge theories, by using the s-rule in their string theory realization as brane configurations. In particular, supersymmetry is broken in N=3 supersymmetric Yang-Mills-Chern-Simons theory with gauge group SU(n) and CS coefficient k, as well as in its N=2 and N=1 deformations, when n>|k|. In addition, supersymmetry is broken in the N=1 mass deformation of N=2 supersymmetric Yang-Mills theory with gauge group SU(n) and one matter multiplet when n>1. In the latter case the breaking is induced by an instanton-generated repulsive potential.
Using the relation between D-brane charges and K-theory, we study non-BPS D-branes and their behavior under T-duality. We point out that in general compactifications, D-brane charges are classified by relative K-theory groups. T-duality is found to act as a symmetry between the relative K-theory groups in Type II and Type I/IA theories. We also study Type \tilde\IA theory (which contains an O8^- plane and an O8^+ plane), using K-theory and T-duality to identify its stable D-branes. Comparison with string theory constructions reveals two interesting effects. One of them involves the transfer of branes between O-planes, while in the other, a D-brane charge which seems conserved near one O-plane in fact decays due to the presence of another type of O-plane.
A non-supersymmetric ten-dimensional open string theory is constructed as an orbifold of type I string theory, and as an orientifold of the bosonic type B theory. It is purely bosonic, and cancellation of massless tadpoles requires the gauge group to be SO(32)xSO(32). The spectrum of the theory contains a closed string tachyon, and open string tachyons in the (32,32) multiplet. The D-branes of this theory are analyzed, and it is found that the massless excitations of one of the 1-branes coincide with the world-sheet degrees of freedom of the D=26 bosonic string theory compactified on the SO(32) lattice. This suggests that the two theories are related by S-duality.
We review work done in collaboration with C.B. Thorn on Super-Galilei invariant field theory and its application to the reformulation of superstring theory in terms of constituent superstring-bits.
String-bit models are both an efficient way of organizing string perturbation theory, and a possible non-perturbative composite description of string theory. This is a summary of ideas and results of string-bit and superstring-bit models, as presented in the Strings '96 conference.
We argue that the behavior of string theory at high temperature and high longitudinal boosts, combined with the emergence of p-branes as necessary ingredients in various string dualities, point to a possible reformulation of strings, as well as p-branes, as composites of bits. We review the string-bit models, and suggest generalizations to incorporate p-branes.
We construct a 1+1 dimensional superstring-bit model for D=3 Type IIB superstring. This low dimension model escapes the problems encountered in higher dimension models: (1) It possesses full Galilean supersymmetry; (2) For noninteracting polymers of bits, the exactly soluble linear superpotential describing bit interactions is in a large universality class of superpotentials which includes ones bounded at spatial infinity; (3) The latter are used to construct a superstring-bit model with the clustering properties needed to define an $S$-matrix for closed polymers of superstring-bits.
We extend the Galilei group of space-time transformations by gradation, construct interacting field-theoretic representations of this algebra, and show that non-relativistic Super-Chern-Simons theory is a special case. We also study the generalization to matrix valued fields, which are relevant to the formulation of superstring theory as a $1/N_c$ expansion of a field theory. We find that in the matrix case, the field theory is much more restricted by the supersymmetry.
We extend the model of string as a polymer of string bits to the case of superstring. We mainly concentrate on type II-B superstring, with some discussion of the obstacles presented by not II-B superstring, together with possible strategies for surmounting them. As with previous work on bosonic string we work within the light-cone gauge. The bit model possesses a good deal less symmetry than the continuous string theory. For one thing, the bit model is formulated as a Galilei invariant theory in $(D-2)+1$ dimensional space-time. This means that Poincaré invariance is reduced to the Galilei subgroup in $D-2$ space dimensions. Naturally the supersymmetry present in the bit model is likewise dramatically reduced. Continuous string can arise in the bit models with the formation of infinitely long polymers of string bits. Under the right circumstances (at the critical dimension) these polymers can behave as string moving in $D$ dimensional space-time enjoying the full $N=2$ Poincaré supersymmetric dynamics of type II-B superstring.