Related papers: The Quasicrystalline String Landscape
This is the second part of the work where quasi-modular forms emerge from small exotic smooth $\mathbb{R}^4$'s grouped in a fixed radial family. SU(2) Seiberg-Witten theory when formulated on exotic $\mathbb{R}^4$ from the radial family, in…
Exotic tiling patterns of quasicrystals have gotten a lot of attention for unique quantum phenomena such as critical state and multifractality. In this regard, finding new quasi-periodic tiling patterns and the relevant quantum states is…
These lectures are devoted to introducing some of the basic features of quantum geometry that have been emerging from compactified string theory over the last couple of years. The developments discussed include new geometric features of…
We classify orbifold geometries which can be interpreted as moduli spaces of four-dimensional $\mathcal{N}\geq 3$ superconformal field theories up to rank 2 (complex dimension 6). The large majority of the geometries we find correspond to…
We make a number of conjectures about the geometry of continuous moduli parameterizing the string landscape. In particular we conjecture that such moduli are always given by expectation value of scalar fields and that moduli spaces with…
We systematically include central charges into supersymmetric quantum mechanics formulated on curved Euclidean spaces, and explain how the background geometry manifests itself on states of the theory. In particular, we show in detail how,…
We study toroidal compactifications of string theories which include compactification of a timelike coordinate. Some new features in the theory of toroidal compactifications arise. Most notably, Narain moduli space does not exist as a…
A two-dimensional system of soft particles interacting via a two-length-scale potential is studied. Density functional theory and Brownian dynamics simulations reveal a fluid phase and two crystalline phases with different lattice spacing.…
Over the past three decades, considerable effort has been devoted to studying the rich and diverse phenomenologies of heterotic strings exhibiting spacetime supersymmetry. Unfortunately, during this same period, there has been relatively…
A large class of new 4-D superstring vacua with non-trivial/singular geometries, spacetime supersymmetry and other background fields (axion, dilaton) are found. Killing symmetries are generic and are associated with non-trivial dilaton and…
Noncommutative geometry has seen remarkable applications for high energy physics, viz. the geometrical interpretation of the Standard Model. The question whether it also allows for supersymmetric theories has so far not been answered in a…
Type II compactifications with varying string coupling can be described elegantly in F-theory/M-theory as compactifications on U - manifolds. Using a similar approach to describe Super Yang-Mills with a varying coupling constant, we argue…
Studying a quantum field theory involves a choice of space-time manifold and a choice of background for any global symmetries of the theory. We argue that many more choices are possible when specifying the background. In the context of…
Quantum anomalies, determined by the Atiyah-Singer index theorem, place strong constraints on the space of quantum gravity theories in six dimensions with minimal supersymmetry. The conjecture of "string universality" states that all such…
We argue that a class of ``non-critical superstring'' vacua is holographically related to the (non-gravitational) theory obtained by studying string theory on a singular Calabi-Yau manifold in the decoupling limit $g_s\to 0$. In two…
We study a class of type I string models with supersymmetry broken on the world-volume of some D-branes and vanishing tree-level potential. Despite the non-supersymmetric spectrum, supersymmetry is non-linearly realized on these D-branes,…
We propose non-supersymmetric analogues of 6d N=2 Type II/heterotic dualities via a quotient of a K3 surface: an Enriques surface. We start from Type~II strings on a K3 surface and construct orbifold theories using an involution of K3. We…
In this lecture I summarize recent developments on strings propagating in curved spacetime. Exact conformal field theories that describe gravitational backgrounds such as black holes and more intricate gravitational singularities have been…
We define string geometry: spaces of superstrings including the interactions, their topologies, charts, and metrics. Trajectories in asymptotic processes on a space of strings reproduce the right moduli space of the super Riemann surfaces…
Calabi-Yau spaces, or Kahler spaces admitting zero Ricci curvature, have played a pivotal role in theoretical physics and pure mathematics for the last half-century. In physics, they constituted the first and natural solution to…