Related papers: Three-forms, dualities and membranes in four-dimen…
We review the remarkable interplay between modular symmetries and supergravity, which has led to major advances in both physics and mathematics in recent decades. Our focus will be on four-dimensional models with $\mathcal{N}=1$ and…
We present an approach to membrane quantization using matrix quantum mechanics at large N. We show that this leads (through a simple field theory of two-dimensional open strings and the associated SU(\infty) current algebra) to a 4-D…
The gauge transformations of p-form fields in supergravity theories acquire a non-commuting character when one introduces potentials both for the theory's original field strengths and for their duals. This has previously been shown in the…
We present theories of N=2 hypermultiplets in four spacetime dimensions that are invariant under rigid or local superconformal symmetries. The target spaces of theories with rigid superconformal invariance are (4n)-dimensional {\it special}…
In these lectures I review the general structure of electric--magnetic duality rotations in every even space--time dimension. In four dimensions, which is my main concern, I discuss the general issue of symplectic covariance and how it…
We formulate off-shell N=1 superconformal higher spin multiplets in four spacetime dimensions and briefly discuss their coupling to conformal supergravity. As an example, we explicitly work out the coupling of the superconformal gravitino…
Heterotic string compactifications on a $K3$ surface $\mathfrak{S}$ depend on a choice of hyperk\"ahler metric, anti-self-dual gauge connection and Kalb-Ramond flux, parametrized by hypermultiplet scalars. The metric on hypermultiplet…
We study N=1 dualities in four dimensional supersymmetric gauge theories in terms of wrapping D 6-branes around 3-cycles of Calabi-Yau threefolds in type IIA string theory. We generalize the recent work of geometrical realization for the…
The four dimensional gauged supergravities descending from non-geometric string compactifications involve a wide class of flux objects which are needed to make the theory invariant under duality transformations at the effective level.…
We examine duality transformations of supersymmetric and $\kappa$-symmetric Dp-brane actions in a general type II supergravity background where in particular the dilaton and the axion are supposed to not be zero or a constant but a general…
A naive dimensional reduction of the $N=1, D=10$ supergravity theory that naturally arises in five-brane models is used to determine the r\^ole of two fields which are basic ingredients of string models: the dilaton and, among the moduli,…
In this paper we study 3-form gauge fields in four-dimensional N=1 supersymmetric theories. We give the sigma model action together with its Poincare dual action for massless and massive 3-forms. The resulting target space geometries are…
U-duality p-branes in toroidally compactified type II superstring theories in space-time dimensions $10 > D \ge 4$ can be constructed explicitly based on the conjectured U-duality symmetries and the corresponding known single-charge super…
We report on the construction of four dimensional gauged supergravity models that can be interpreted as type IIB orientifold compactification in presence of 3-form fluxes and D3--branes. We mainly address our attention to the symplectic…
We use localization techniques to study duality in N = 2 supersymmetric gauge theories in three dimensions. Specifically, we consider a duality due to Aharony involving unitary and symplectic gauge groups, which is similar to Seiberg…
We investigate duality properties of N-form fields, provide a symmetric way of coupling them to electric/magnetic sources, and check that these charges obey the appropriate quantization requirements. First, we contrast the D=4k case, in…
We present a first-principles derivation of the K\"ahler metric for axion-like moduli of conformally Calabi-Yau compactifications of IIB string theory with imaginary self-dual 3-form flux at the classical level. We find that the warp factor…
Summarizing the results of arXiv:0707.1038, we discuss the four-dimensional effective approach to type II N=1 supersymmetric flux compactifications with general SU(3)x SU(3)-structure. In particular, we study the effect of a non-trivial…
We consider N=2 supergravity in four dimensions, coupled to an arbitrary number of vector- and hypermultiplets, where abelian isometries of the quaternionic hyperscalar target manifold are gauged. Using a static and spherically or…
We describe the couplings of six-dimensional supergravity, which contain a self-dual tensor multiplet, to $n_T$ anti-self-dual tensor matter multiplets, $n_V$ vector multiplets and $n_H$ hypermultiplets. The scalar fields of the tensor…