Related papers: The Fate of Massive Closed Strings

We perform an extensive analysis of the statistics of axion masses and interactions in compactifications of type IIB string theory, and we show that black hole superradiance excludes some regions of Calabi-Yau moduli space. Regardless of…

We test exact marginality of the deformation describing the blow-up of a zero-size D(-1) brane bound to a background of D3-branes by analyzing the equations of motion of superstring field theory to third order in the size. In the process we…

In theories with TeV scale quantum gravity the standard model particles live on a brane propagating in large extra dimensions. Branes may be stabilized at large (sub-millimeter) distances from each other, either due to weak Van der Waals…

We investigate numerically the configurational statistics of strings. The algorithm models an ensemble of global $U(1)$ cosmic strings, or equivalently vortices in superfluid $^4$He. We use a new method which avoids the specification of…

We give a systematic derivation of the consistency conditions which constrain open-closed disk amplitudes of topological strings. They include the A-infinity relations (which generalize associativity of the boundary product of topological…

We show that, in string theory, the quantum evaporation and decay of black holes in two-dimensional target space is related to imaginary parts in higher-genus string amplitudes. These arise from the regularisation of modular infinities due…

We study the massive spectrum of fully wrapped branes in warped M-theory compactifications, including regimes where these states are parametrically lighter than the Planck scale or string scale. We show that many such states behave…

We study a string theory inspired model for hybrid inflation in the context of a brane-antibrane system partially compactified on a compact submanifold of (a caricature of) a Calabi-Yau manifold. The interbrane distance acts as the…

We show that the naive application of the Kibble mechanism seriously underestimates the initial density of cosmic superstrings that can be formed during the annihilation of D-branes in the early universe, as in models of brane-antibrane…

We address the question how string compactifications with D-branes are consistent with the black hole bound, which arises in any theory with number of particle species to which the black holes can evaporate. For the Kaluza-Klein particles,…

Recently it has been conjectured that string theory does not allow for dS vacua or dS extrema. To scrutinize such a conjecture, it is important to study concrete string theory compactifications and spell out their assumptions and potential…

We investigate special compactifications of the heterotic string for which the space of half-BPS states is, in a natural way, a representation of various subgroups of the Conway group. These compactifications provide a useful framework for…

We propose a scenario for realizing super-Planckian axion decay constants in Calabi-Yau orientifolds of type IIB string theory, leading to large-field inflation. Our construction is a simple embedding in string theory of the mechanism of…

In these lectures, we review the main properties of the topological theory obtained by twisting the N=2 two-dimensional superconformal algebra, associated to supersymmetric string compactifications. In particular, we describe a set of…

The Weak Gravity Conjecture, if valid, rules out simple models of Natural Inflation by restricting their axion decay constant to be sub-Planckian. We revisit stringy attempts to realise Natural Inflation, with a single open string axionic…

We study the mass and different RR charge distributions of the BPS (p,p-2)-brane bound states in the closed string brane-like $\sigma$-model. We show that such brane bound states can be realized by introducing a constant B field in the…

We propose a non-perturbative definition for refined topological strings. This can be used to compute the partition function of superconformal theories in 5 dimensions on squashed S^5 and the superconformal index of a large number of 6…

We propose expressions for refined open topological string partition function on certain non-compact Calabi Yau 3-folds with topological branes wrapped on the special lagrangian submanifolds. The corresponding web diagrams are partially…

We analyse the perturbative massive open string spectrum of even dimensional superstring compactifications with four, eight and sixteen supercharges. In each of such cases, we focus on universal states that exist independently on the…

In this paper, which is a revised version of the author's PhD thesis, we analyze two different applications of string theory. In the first part, we focus on four dimensional compactifications of Type II string theories preserving N=1…