Related papers: New Discrete States in Two-Dimensional Supergravit…
We describe the magnetic phase of SU(N) $\mathcal{N}=2$ Super Yang-Mills theories in the self-dual Omega background in terms of a new class of multi-cut matrix models. These arise from a non-perturbative completion of topological strings in…
During the last ten years, intriguing dualities between gauge and string theory have been found and explored. They provide a novel window on strongly coupled gauge physics, including QCD-like models. Based on a short historical review of…
A familiar anomaly affects SU(2) gauge theory in four dimensions: a theory with an odd number of fermion multiplets in the spin 1/2 representation of the gauge group, and more generally in representations of spin 2r+1/2, is inconsistent. We…
The most detailed constructions of microstate geometries, and particularly of superstrata, are done using $\mathcal{N} = (1,0)$ supergravity coupled to two anti-self-dual tensor multiplets in six dimensions. We show that an important…
String theory, specifically type-II superstring theory, can be formulated in any ten-dimensional signature. To facilitate the study of supergravity and superstring theories in this setting, we present a uniform construction of supersymmetry…
This dissertation consists of a comprehensive and pedagogical review of Maldacena's original derivation of the AdS/CFT correspondence and the main topics of string theory necessary to understand it. The large $N$ expansion of Yang-Mills…
We study the BRST cohomology for $SL(2,R)/U(1)$ coset model, which describes an exact string black hole solution. It is shown that the physical spectrum could contain not only the extra discrete states corresponding to those in $c=1$…
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…
The massless fields in the universal NS-NS sector of string theory form $O(D, D)$ multiplets of Double Field Theory, which is a theory that provides a T-duality covariant formulation of supergravity, leading to a stringy modification of…
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 complete the construction of vacuum string field theory by proposing a canonical choice of ghost kinetic term -- a local insertion of the ghost field at the string midpoint with an infinite normalization. This choice, supported by level…
I investigate two discrete models of random geometries, namely simplicial quantum gravity and quantum string theory. In four-dimensional simplicial quantum gravity, I show that the addition of matter gauge fields to the model is capable of…
The existence of non-singular string cosmologies is established in a class of two-dimensional supersymmetric Hybrid models at finite temperature. The left-moving sector of the Hybrid models gives rise to 16 real (N_4=4) spacetime…
A global superalgebra with 32 supercharges and all possible central extensions is studied in order to extract some general properties of duality and hidden dimensions in a theory that treats $p$-branes democratically. The maximal number of…
We briefly review a class of four dimensional $\mathcal N=3$ field theories constructed by taking a quotient of $\mathcal N=4$ SYM with gauge group $U(N)$. The quotient involves a discrete symmetry that only exists for specific, order one,…
A correspondence between type IIB string theory with N D7-branes on R^{1,3} x C^1/Z_2 x T^2/Z_2 x T^2/Z_2 and pure N=1 SU(N) gauge theory in four dimensions is proposed and argued. First the supergravity background of unwrapped and flat…
We study Little String Theories (LST) with ${\cal N}=(1,0)$ supersymmetry arising, in a suitable double scaling limit, from 5-branes in heterotic string theory or in the heterotic-like type II/$(-)^{F_L}\times {\rm shift}$. The limit in…
Recently, it has been proposed by Maldacena that large $N$ limits of certain conformal field theories in $d$ dimensions can be described in terms of supergravity (and string theory) on the product of $d+1$-dimensional $AdS$ space with a…
We describe a class of diffeomorphism invariant SU(N) gauge theories in N^2 dimensions, together with some matter couplings. These theories have (N^2-3)(N^2-1) local degrees of freedom, and have the unusual feature that the constraint…
We describe new $N$-extended 2D supergravities on a $(p+1)$-dimensional (bosonic) space. The fundamental objects are moving frame densities that equip each $(p+1)$-dimensional point with a 2D ``tangent space''. The theory is presented in a…