Related papers: The mystery of the brane relation
We analyse the geometrical structure of supersymmetric solutions of type II supergravity of the form R^{1,9-n} x M_n with non-trivial NS flux and dilaton. Solutions of this type arise naturally as the near-horizon limits of wrapped NS…
We study the type IIB brane box configurations recently introduced by Hanany and Zaffaroni. We show that even at finite string coupling, one can construct smooth configurations of branes with fairly arbitrary gauge and flavor structure.…
We study brane configurations in the presence of orientifold six-planes. After deriving the curves for N=2 supersymmetric SU(Nc) gauge theories with one flavor in the symmetric or antisymmetric representation and Nf fundamental flavors, we…
We study the correspondence between the large $N$ limit of ${\cal N} = 2$ three dimensional superconformal field theories and M theory on orbifolds of $AdS_4 \times {\bf S^7}$. We identify the brane configuration which gives $C^3/Z_3$ as a…
We consider a homological enlargement of the mapping class group, defined by homology cylinders over a closed oriented surface (up to homology cobordism). These are important model objects in the recent Goussarov-Habiro theory of…
Following Goussarov's paper `Interdependent Modifications of Links and Invariants of Finite Degree' [Topology 37 (1998) 595--602] we describe an alternative finite type theory of knots. While (as shown by Goussarov) the alternative theory…
We present three lectures on heterotic M-theory and a fourth lecture extending this theory to more general orbifolds. In Lecture 1, Horava-Witten theory is briefly discussed. We then compactify this theory on Calabi-Yau threefolds, choosing…
We discuss unoriented quivers with flavour that arise from D3-branes at local orbifold singularities, in the presence of Omega-planes and non-compact D7-branes. We produce a wide class of unoriented quiver gauge theories, including new…
We define two new families of invariants for (3-manifold, graph) pairs which detect the unknot and are additive under connected sum of pairs and (-1/2)-additive under trivalent vertex sum of pairs. The first of these families is closely…
We study the Higgs branch of 5d superconformal theories engineered from brane webs with orientifold five-planes. We propose a generalization of the rules to derive magnetic quivers from brane webs pioneered in arXiv:2004.04082, by analyzing…
We study a gravity solution corresponding to fivebranes wrapped on the $S^2$ of the resolved conifold. By changing a parameter the solution continuously interpolates between the deformed conifold with flux and the resolved conifold with…
Open branes ending on other branes, which may be referred to as the host branes, are studied in the superembedding formalism. The open brane, host brane and the target space in which they are both embedded are all taken to be…
We consider the interplay between brane constructions and type IIA, IIB or M-theory geometries on Calabi-Yau (CY) and G_2 holonomy manifolds. This is related to N=1 (and N=2) gauge theories in four dimensions. We first discuss simple…
This paper examines various aspects of the recently proposed theory of coincident membranes by Bagger and Lambert. These include the properties of open membranes and the resulting boundary theory with an interpretation in terms of the…
This is an expository paper describing the geometry of certain Sasakian-Einstein manifolds. Such manifolds have recently become of interest due to Maldacena's AdS/CFT conjecture. They describe near-horizon geometries of branes at conical…
Suppose there are two framed links in a compact, connected 3-manifold (possibly with boundary, or non-orientable) such that the associated 3-manifolds obtained by surgery are homeomorphic (relative to their common boundary, if there is…
We present a formal supersymmetric solution of type IIB supergravity generalizing previously known solutions corresponding to D3 branes to geometries without an orthogonal split between parallel and transverse directions. The metric is…
We establish enhanced bounds on Cheeger-Gromov rho-invariants for general 3-manifolds and yet stronger bounds for special classes of 3-manifold. As key ingredients, we construct chain null-homotopies whose complexity is linearly bounded by…
Close studies of the solitonic solutions of D=11 N=1 supergravity theory provide a deeper understanding of the elusive M-theory and constitute steps towards its final formulation. In this work, we propose the use of calibration techniques…
We study the Goussarov-Habiro finite type invariants theory for framed string links in homology balls. Their degree 1 invariants are computed: they are given by Milnor's triple linking numbers, the mod 2 reduction of the Sato-Levine…