Related papers: Penrose Limits, the Colliding Plane Wave Problem a…
Starting from a sigma-model for a doubled target-space geometry, we show that the number of target-space dimensions can be reduced by half through a gauging procedure. We apply this formalism to a class of backgrounds relevant for double…
These lectures give an introduction to the novel duality relating type IIB string theory in a maximally supersymmetric plane-wave background to N=4, d=4, U(N) Super Yang-Mills theory in a particular large N and large R-charge limit due to…
The AdS/CFT correspondence provides a rich testing ground for many important topics in theoretical physics. The earliest and most striking example of the correspondence is the conjectured duality between the energy spectrum of type IIB…
The target space of minimal $(2,2m-1)$ strings is embedded into the phase space of an integrable mechanical model. Quantum effects on the target space correspond to quantum corrections on the mechanical model. In particular double scaling…
Motivated by the search for potentially exactly solvable time-dependent string backgrounds, we determine all homogeneous plane wave (HPW) metrics in any dimension and find one family of HPWs with geodesically complete metrics and another…
We consider the (2, 0) supersymmetric theory of tensor multiplets and self-dual strings in six space-time dimensions. Space-time diffeomorphisms that leave the string world-sheet invariant appear as gauge transformations on the normal…
We embed the Penrose limit into the Weyl classical double copy. Thereby, we provide a lift of the double copy properties of plane wave spacetimes into black hole geometries and we open a novel avenue towards taking the classical double copy…
We consider open strings ending on a D5-brane in the pp-wave background, which is realized in the Penrose limit of $AdS_5 \times S^5$ with an $AdS_4\times S^2$ brane. A complete list of gauge invariant operators in the defect conformal…
We discuss the causal structure of pp-wave spacetimes using the ideal point construction outlined by Geroch, Kronheimer, and Penrose. This generalizes the recent work of Marolf and Ross, who considered similar issues for plane wave…
We study semiclassical strings in the Klebanov-Witten and in the Non-abelian T-dual Klebanov-Witten backgrounds. We show that both backgrounds share a subsector of equivalent states up to conditions on the T-dual coordinates which also…
We investigate the string theory on three dimensional black holes discovered by Ba\~{n}ados, Teitelboim and Zanelli in the framework of conformal field theory. The model is described by an orbifold of the $\widetilde{SL}(2,R)$ WZW model.…
Toroidal backgrounds for bosonic strings are used to understand target space duality as a symmetry of string field theory and to study explicitly issues in background independence. Our starting point is the notion that the string field…
We search for stochastic gravitational wave background emitted from cosmic strings using the Parkes Pulsar Timing Array data over 15 years. While we find that the common power-law excess revealed by several pulsar timing array experiments…
We derive and analyze the conditions for quantum conformal and Lorentz invariance of the duality symmetric interacting chiral boson sigma-models, which are conjectured to describe non-geometric string theory backgrounds. The one-loop Weyl…
We consider a new 3-parameter class of exact 4-dimensional solutions in closed string theory and solve the corresponding string model, determining the physical spectrum and the partition function. The background fields (4-metric,…
We construct cosmological spacetimes with null Kasner-like singularities as purely gravitational solutions with no other background fields turned on. These can be recast as anisotropic plane-wave spacetimes by coordinate transformations. We…
We confront the problem of giving a fundamental definition to perturbative string theory in spacetimes with totally compact space (taken to be a torus for simplicity, though the nature of the problem is very general) and non-compact time.…
String propagation on D-dimensional curved backgrounds with Lorentzian signature is formulated as a geometrical problem of embedding surfaces. When the spatial part of the background corresponds to a general WZW model for a compact group,…
We study past horizons in the class of type II Robinson-Trautman vacuum spacetimes with a cosmological constant. These exact radiative solutions of Einstein's equations exist in the future of any sufficiently smooth initial data, and they…
A WZW model for the non-semi-simple D-dimensional Heisenberg group, which directly generalizes the E_{2}^{c} group, is constructed. It is found to correspond to an D-dimensional string background of plane-wave type with physical Lorentz…