Related papers: F-theory and the Classification of Little Strings
In this lecture we review some of the recent developments in string theory on an introductory and qualitative level. In particular we focus on S-T-U dualities of toroidally compactified ten-dimensional string theories and outline the…
String theory is canonically accompanied with a space-time interpretation which determines S-matrix-like observables, and connects to the standard physics at low energies in the guise of local effective field theory. Recently, we have…
Large extra dimensions, of size of order of TeV^{-1} ~= 10^{-16} cm, arise naturally in the context of supersymmetry breaking in string theory, while strings at a TeV scale offer a solution to the gauge hierarchy problem, as an alternative…
String theory is the prime candidate for the theory of everything. However, it must be defined in ten dimensions to be consistent. To get 4D physics, the 6 other dimensions should be curled up in a small compact manifold, this procedure is…
We study compactifications of the 6d E-string theory, the theory of a small E_8 instanton, to four dimensions. In particular we identify N=1 field theories in four dimensions corresponding to compactifications on arbitrary Riemann surfaces…
Light-cone gauge superstring theory in noncritical dimensions corresponds to a worldsheet theory with nonstandard longitudinal part in the conformal gauge. The longitudinal part of the worldsheet theory is a superconformal field theory…
String theory avoids the ultraviolet infinities that arise in trying to quantize gravity. It is also more predictive than conventional quantum field theory, one aspect of this being the way that it contributed to the emergence of the…
Double Field Theory (DFT) is a low-energy effective theory of a manifestly $O(D,D)$ invariant formulation of the closed string theory when toroidally compactified dimensions are present. The theory is based on a doubled spacetime structure…
We present several classes of new 6d string theories which arise via branes at orbifold singularities. They have compact moduli spaces, associated with tensor multiplets, given by Weyl alcoves of non-Abelian groups. We discuss T-duality and…
We perform a global analysis of the space of consistent 6D quantum gravity theories with N = 1 supersymmetry, including models with multiple tensor multiplets. We prove that for theories with fewer than T = 9 tensor multiplets, a finite…
We describe a class of time-dependent solutions in string- or M-theory that are exact with respect to alpha-prime and curvature corrections and interpolate in physical space between regions in which the low energy physics is…
A generic aspect of low-energy effective field theories (EFTs) coming from string compactifications is the appearance of moduli fields. Among these moduli, the axion and dilaton are present as (pseudo-) Goldstone bosons from the spontaneous…
Concrete semi-realistic string/M theory constructions often predict the existence of new physics at the TeV scale, which may be different in character from the bottom-up ideas that are motivated by specific problems of the standard model. I…
We discuss a class of Little String Theories (LSTs) whose low energy descriptions are supersymmetric gauge theories on the $\Omega$-background with gauge group $U(N)$ and matter in the adjoint representation. We show that the instanton…
We study the ground states and left-excited states of the A_{k-1} N=(2,0) little string theory. Via a theorem by Atiyah [1], these sectors can be captured by a supersymmetric nonlinear sigma model on CP^1 with target space the based loop…
In this dissertation, we study the generalized symmetries in supergravities and superconformal field theories from the string theory perspective. Part one is devoted to the study of string universality in high spacetime dimensions.…
AdS/CFT is a conjectured equivalence between a field theory without gravity (conformal field theory) and a string theory in a special curved background (anti de-Sitter space), where theories on both sides of the equivalence is…
Starting from type IIB string theory on an $ADE$ singularity, the $(2,0)$ little string arises when one takes the string coupling $g_s$ to 0. In this setup, we give a unified description of the codimension-two defects of the little string,…
In many cases the symmetry structure of quantum field theories can be neatly encoded into their associated symmetry topological field theory (SymTFT), a topological field theory in one dimension higher. For geometrically engineered QFTs in…
A large class of two-dimensional topological conformal field theories (TCFTs) are obtained by the twisting construction of Witten and Eguchi-Yang. However there seem to exist TCFTs which are not obtained in this way; for instance, TCFTs…