Related papers: Strings and membranes from $\mathcal{A}$-theory fi…
U-duality symmetry of M-theory and S and T-duality of string theory can be used to study various black branes solutions. We explore some aspect of this idea here. This symmetry can be used to get relations among various components of the…
Configurations of fivebranes, twobranes and fourbranes in type IIA string theory, which give (1+1) dimensional supersymmetric gauge theories in the low energy limit, are constructed. It is shown that these brane configurations are…
We present an ansatz for black 2-branes in five dimensional N=2 supergravity theory that carry magnetic charge with respect to general hypermultiplet scalars. We find explicit solutions in certain special cases and examine the constraints…
We construct intersecting D-brane configurations that encode the gauge groups and field content of dual N=4 supersymmetric gauge theories in three dimensions. The duality which exchanges the Coulomb and Higgs branches and the…
After simultaneous compactification of spacetime and worldvolume on $K3$, the $D=10$ heterotic fivebrane with gauge group $SO(32)$ behaves like a $D=6$ heterotic string with gauge group $SO(28) \times SU(2)$, but with Kac--Moody levels…
The dynamics of a probe M5-brane, embedded as a hypersurface in eleven-dimensional Minkowski spacetime, is described by a six-dimensional world-volume theory. This theory has a variety of interesting symmetries some of which are obscure in…
These lectures intend to give a pedagogical introduction into some of the developments in string theory during the last years. They include perturbative T-duality and non perturbative S- and U-dualities, their unavoidable demand for…
Five-branes lead in four dimensions to massless N=1 supermultiplets if M-theory is compactified on S1/Z2 x (a Calabi-Yau threefold). One of them describes the modulus associated with the position of the five-brane along the circle S1. We…
The maximal gauged supergravities in five spacetime dimensions with gauge groups contained in $\mathbb{R}^+ \times \textrm{E}_{6(6)}$ are described. The $\textrm{E}_{6(6)}$ factor is the duality group of ungauged maximal supergravity and…
A popular way to study N=1 supersymmetric gauge theories is to realize them geometrically in string theory, as suspended brane constructions, D-branes wrapping cycles in Calabi-Yau manifolds, orbifolds, and otherwise. Among the applications…
We consider the D-branes that occur in IIA/IIB string theory compactified on a torus. We review how a general expression for the Wess-Zumino term of such branes is derived. We also review the method to determine the D-brane Wess-Zumino term…
We review developments in the theory of multiple, parallel membranes in M-theory. After discussing the inherent difficulties pertaining to a maximally supersymmetric lagrangian formulation with the appropriate field content and symmetries,…
We present an action for a six-dimensional superconformal field theory containing a non-abelian tensor multiplet. All of the ingredients of this action have been available in the literature. We bring these pieces together by choosing the…
We study the SO(8) superconformal theory proposed recently by Bagger and Lambert as a possible worldvolume theory for multiple M2-branes. For their explicit example with gauge group SO(4), we rewrite the theory (originally formulated in…
We present a construction in Matrix theory of longitudinal 5-branes whose geometry in transverse space corresponds to a 4-sphere. We describe these branes through an explicit construction in terms of N*N matrices for a particular infinite…
We consider superconformal field theories in three and six dimensions with eight supercharges which can be realized on the world-volume of M-theory branes sitting at orbifold singularities. We find that they should admit a N=4 and N=2…
This thesis is devoted to various questions connected with duality. It is composed of two parts. The first part discusses some aspects of timelike T-duality. We explore the possibility of compactification of supergravity theories with…
We investigate Seiberg's N=1 field theory duality for four-dimensional supersymmetric QCD with the M-theory 5-brane. We find that the M-theory configuration for the magnetic dual theory arises via a smooth deformation of the M-theory…
We analyze M theory fivebrane in order to study the moduli space of vacua of N=1 supersymmetric $Sp(N_c)$ gauge theories with $N_f$ flavors in four dimensions. We show how the N=2 Higgs branch can be encoded in M theory by studying the…
It has been shown that membranes and fivebranes are wave-like or monopole-like solutions in some higher dimensional theory. Here the picture is completed by combining the wave and monopole solutions into a single solution of Exceptional…