Related papers: String Webs from Field Theory

The spectrum of stable electrically and magnetically charged supersymmetric particles can change discontinuously due to the decay of these particles as the vacuum on the Coulomb branch is varied. We show that this decay process is well…

We continue to study 5d N=1 supersymmetric field theories and their compactifications on a circle through brane configurations. We develop a model, which we call (p,q) Webs, which enables simple geometrical computations to reproduce the…

String theory, if it describes nature, is probably strongly coupled. As a result, one might despair of making any statements about the theory. In the framework of a set of clearly spelled out assumptions, we show that this is not…

There is evidence that string theory possesses a large discretuum of stable and/or metastable ground states, with zero or four supersymmetries in four dimensions. I discuss critically the nature of this evidence. Assuming this "landscape"…

We study (4,4) supersymmetric field theories in two dimensions with a one dimensional Coulomb branch. These theories have applications in string theory. Our analysis explains the known relation between $A-D-E$ groups and modular invariants…

Four-dimensional string theories predict in general the existence of light exotic particles with fractional electric charges. Such particles could escape present observations if they are confined by a gauge group of the "hidden" sector into…

String theory and supersymmetry are theoretical ideas that go beyond the standard model of particle physics and show promise for unifying all forces. After a brief introduction to supersymmetry, we discuss the prospects for its experimental…

We report on a large scale numerical study of networks of semilocal cosmic strings in flat space in the parameter regime in which they are perturbatively stable. We find a population of segments with an exponential length distribution and…

We study duals to field theories in two dimensions with N=(4,4) SUSY. The string backgrounds reproduce certain non-perturbative aspects of the dual field theory with a large number of colors N_c and a tunable number of flavors N_f.…

The Standard Model is the low-energy limit of a microscopic theory which includes extra dimensions and new symmetries. A part of my thesis consisted in constructing a new class of models with two extra dimensions. We showed that these…

We discuss the continuum field theory limit of the physical scenario described in Ref. [1], the universe arising from the interpretation of the most general collection of logical codes in terms of distributions of units of energy along…

In a recent paper [1] we showed that N=1 supersymmetric QCD in the presence of certain superpotential deformations has a rich landscape of supersymmetric and non-supersymmetric vacua. In this paper we embed this theory in string theory as a…

Cosmic (super)strings offer promising ways to test ideas about the early universe and physics at high energies. While in field theory constructions their tension is usually assumed to be constant (or at most slowly-varying), this is often…

Flat directions are a generic feature of the scalar potential in supersymmetric gauge field theories. They can arise, for example, from D-terms associated with an extra abelian gauge symmetry. Even when supersymmetry is broken softly, there…

Superstring theories are very promising theoretically, but the enormous landscape of string vacua and the (likely) very large underlying string scale imply that they may never be tested directly. Nevertheless, concrete constructions…

Dense distributions of string-like objects in material media are considered in terms of continuum field theory. The strings are assumed to carry a quantized abelian topological charge, such as the Burgers vector of dislocations in solids or…

We demonstrate that string consistency in four spacetime dimensions leads to a spectrum of string states which satisfies the supertrace constraints Str(M^0)=0 and Str(M^2)=\Lambda at tree level, where \Lambda is the one-loop string…

We give examples of string compactifications to 4d Minkowski space with different amounts of supersymmetry that can be connected by spherical domain walls. The tension of these domain walls is tunably lower than the 4d Planck scale. The…

The observation of a scalar resonance at the LHC, compatible with perturbative electroweak symmetry breaking, reinforces the Standard Model parameterisation of all subatomic data. The logarithmic evolution of the SM gauge and matter…

We study (non-renormalizable) five dimensional supersymmetric field theories. The theories are parametrized by quark masses and a gauge coupling. We derive the metric on the Coulomb branch exactly. We use stringy considerations to learn…