Related papers: Vacuum Geometry and the Search for New Physics
We analyse symmetry breaking in general gauge theories paying particular attention to the underlying geometry of the theory. In this context we find two natural metrics upon the vacuum manifold: a Euclidean metric associated with the scalar…
In the context of studying string backgrounds, much work has been devoted to the question of how similar a general quantum field theory (specifically, a two-dimensional superconformal theory) is to a sigma model. Put differently, one would…
We study dynamical supersymmetry breaking in vector-like superconformal N=1 gauge theories. We find appropriate deformations of the superpotential to overcome the problem of the instability of the non supersymmetric vacuum. The request for…
The symmetric spaces that appear as moduli spaces in string theory and supergravity can be decomposed with explicit metrics using parabolic subgroups. The resulting isometry between the original moduli space and this decomposition can be…
The subject of this thesis are various ways to construct four-dimensional quantum field theories from string theory. In a first part we study the generation of a supersymmetric Yang-Mills theory, coupled to an adjoint chiral superfield,…
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…
The classifying space of inertial reference frames in special relativity is naturally hyperbolic. There is a remarkable interplay between central elements of hyperbolic geometry and those of special relativity -- which, to a certain extent,…
We present an exact description of the metric on the moduli space of vacua and the spectrum of massive states for four dimensional N=2 supersymmetric SU(n) gauge theories. The moduli space of quantum vacua is identified with the moduli…
We propose a new method to define theories of random geometries, using an explicit and simple map between metrics and large hermitian matrices. We outline some of the many possible applications of the formalism. For example, a…
Vacuum structure and global cosmic strings are analyzed in the effective theory of self-interacting O(2) scalar fields on (3+1)-manifolds with conical singularities. In the context of one-loop effective action computed by heat-kernel…
We study $N=1$ supersymmetric $SP(N_c)$ gauge theories with $N_f$ flavors of quarks in the fundamental representation. Depending on $N_f$ and $N_c$, we find exact, dynamically generated superpotentials, smooth quantum moduli spaces of…
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…
We have studied the reconstruction of supersymmetric theories at high scales by evolving the fundamental parameters from the electroweak scale upwards. Universal minimal supergravity and gauge mediated supersymmetry breaking have been taken…
These lectures discuss some of the general issues in developing a phenomenology for Superstring Theory/M Theory. The focus is on the question: how might one obtain robust, generic predictions. For example, does the theory predict low energy…
We use the Konishi anomaly equations to construct the exact effective superpotential of the glueball superfields in various N=1 supersymmetric gauge theories. We use the superpotentials to study in detail the structure of the spaces of…
One-dimensional sigma-models with N supersymmetries are considered. For conventional supersymmetries there must be N-1 complex structures satisfying a Clifford algebra and the constraints on the target space geometry can be formulated in…
It has recently been proposed that vacuum energy is zero in spite of the quantum-field fluctuations that occur everywhere, even at absolute zero. The implication is that dark energy must have a different origin, unrelated to vacuum energy.…
We develop a new and efficient method to systematically analyse four dimensional effective supergravities which descend from flux compactifications. The issue of finding vacua of such systems, both supersymmetric and non-supersymmetric, is…
We investigate geometrical structures and low-energy theorems of N=1 supersymmetric nonlinear sigma models in four dimensions. When a global symmetry spontaneously breaks down to its subgroup, the low-energy effective Lagrangian of massless…
We study supersymmetric domain walls in N=1 supergravity theories, including those with modular-invariant superpotentials arising in superstring compactifications. Such domain walls are shown to saturate the Bogomol'nyi bound of wall energy…