Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Texas at Austin, 2002. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references. Available also from UMI Company.

Thesis (M.Sc.). / Written for the Dept. of Physics. Title from title page of PDF (viewed 2009/09/07). Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Rutgers University, 2008. / "Graduate Program in Physics and Astronomy." Includes bibliographical references (p. 79-86).

On étude les effets non-perturbatifs généré par des branes instantoniques Euclidiens en compactifications de la théorie des cordes de type I/II avec orientifolds et D-branes magnétisées. Le focus est sur les instantons qui peuvent générer des corrections au superpotentiel. Une condition nécessaire est que les instantons doivent enrouler des cycles rigides. On considère la compactification de la théorie de Type I (IIB) sur l'orientifold T^6/Z_2xZ_2 avec torsion discrète et D-branes magnétisées. Les instantons enroulant le même cycle que l'O-plane exotique (requis par la torsion discrète) ont la structure désiré de modes zéro pour générer des corrections au superpotentiel. On construit des modèles globales basée sur cet orientifold ou les instantons génère des termes linaires et de termes de masse dans le superpotentiel. En théorie des cordes on calcule un couplage physique duquel on doit extraire la partie olomorphique pour obtenir le superpotentiel non-perturbatif. Les facteurs non-olomorphiques sont absorbés dans le potentiel de Kähler et dans redéfinitions des champs chiraux et modules des cordes fermées. On a dérivé ces redéfinitions pour les compactifications toroïdales (avec orientifolds) de la théorie de Type I avec branes magnétisées et lignes Wilson. Finalement, on a considéré des modèles globales avec des termes linéaires. On a calculé explicitement le superpotentiel non-perturbatif pour les orientifolds toroïdales. On a montré comment faire la somme sur les contributions a un instanton. Les modèles analysées possédaient des vides non-perturbatifs supersymétriques ou le group de jauge était brisé et certains modules des cordes ouvertes étaient stabilisés.

In this thesis, we explain and illustrate on several examples how to derive supergravity solutions by computing observables in the corresponding dual, lower-dimensional field theory.<p>In particular, no a priori knowledge on the gravitational dual is assumed, including its dimensionality. The basic idea to construct the pre-geometric models is to consider the world-volume theory of probe D-branes in the presence of a large number N of higher-dimensional background branes. In the standard decoupling limit, the probes are moving only in the flat directions parallel to the background D-branes. We show however that the quantum effective action of the probe world-volume theory, obtained at large $N$ using standard vector model techniques, has the required field content to be interpreted as the action describing the probes in a higher-dimensional, curved and classical spacetime. The properties of the emerging supergravity solution are easily found by comparing the quantum effective action of the pre-geometric model with the non-abelian D-brane action. In all the examples we consider, this allows us to derive the metric, the dilaton and various form fields, overall performing exclusively field theoretic computations.<p><p>The first part of the thesis consists of introductory chapters, where we review vector models at large N, aspects of brane physics in supergravity and string theory and the gauge/gravity correspondence. The second part contains the original contributions of this thesis, consisting of various explicit emergent geometry examples.<p> / Doctorat en Sciences / info:eu-repo/semantics/nonPublished

The gauge/string correspondence provides a non-perturbative definition of string theory and hence quantum gravity in some backgrounds, making it possible to translate statements about strongly coupled quantum field theories into results about gravity. <p><p>In this thesis, we focus on the derivation of holographic backgrounds from the field theory, without using any supergravity input. Instead, we rely crucially on the addition of probe D-branes to the stack of D-branes generating the background.<p>From the field theory description of the probe branes in the presence of the background branes, one can compute an effective action for the probes (in a suitable low-energy/near-horizon limit) by integrating out the background branes. Comparing this action with the D-brane probe action in a generic supergravity background then allows to determine the holographic background dual to the considered field theory vacuum.<p><p>In the first part, the required pre-requisites of field and string theory are recalled and this strategy to derive holographic backgrounds is explained in more detail on the basic case of D3-branes in flat space probed by a small number of D-instantons.<p><p>The second part contains the original results of this thesis, obtained by applying this strategy to several specific examples. We first derive the duals to three continuous deformations (Coulomb branch, β and non-commutative deformations) of the basic case, in the limit in which the D-instantons can probe the full geometry. We then derive the enhançon mechanism in a dual to a simple N=2 quiver gauge theory by using a fractional D-instanton as a probe and exploiting recent exact results on the Coulomb branch of N=2 quivers.<p>Finally, we obtain the near-horizon D4-brane geometry by probing the D4-branes with a small number of D0-branes.<p> / Doctorat en Sciences / info:eu-repo/semantics/nonPublished

Cette thèse se consacre à l'étude de la théorie des cordes en utilisant les outils des théories conformes bidimensionnelles. Dans la première partie, une famille de solutions non-compactes et courbes est etudiées : les modèles de Gepner non-compacts. Dans la deuxième partie, on se concentre sur des problèmes liés à la quantification de la corde en présence de flux RR.

Cette these est consacree a l'etude des theories de supercordes dans les espaces-temps courbes. Nous etudions en particulier l'espace des modules des solutions de NS5-branes et de cordes fondamentales, a l'aide des techniques de deformations marginales de theories conformes. Parmi les exemples etudies se trouvent les espaces-temps anti-de Sitter a trois ou deux dimensions, differentes limites de decouplage de la theorie des petites cordes et l'univers de Goedel. Nous etudions egalement les fonctions de partitions de ces theories conformes, ainsi que les D-branes de certaines d'entre elles. Les applications holographiques potentielles de ces theories sont soulignees.

<p>The appearance in string theory of higher-dimensional objects known as D-branes has been a source of much of the interesting developements in the subject during the past ten years. A very interesting phenomenon occurs when several of these D-branes are made to coincide: The abelian gauge theory living on each brane is enhanced to a non-abelian gauge theory living on the stack of coincident branes. This gives rise to interesting effects like the natural appearance of non-commutative geometry. The theory governing the dynamics of these coincident branes is still poorly understood however and only hints of the underlying structure have been seen.</p><p>This thesis focuses on an attempt to better this understanding by writing down actions for coincident branes using so-called boundary fermions, originating in considerations of open strings, instead of matrices to describe the non-abelian fields. It is shown that by gauge-fixing and by suitably quantizing these boundary fermions the non-abelian action that is known, the Myers action, can be reproduced. Furthermore it is shown that under natural assumptions, unlike the Myers action, the action formulated using boundary fermions also posseses kappa-symmetry, the criterion for being the correct supersymmetric action for coincident D-branes.</p><p>Another aspect of string theory discussed in this thesis is that of tensionless strings. These are of great interest for example because of their possible relation to higher spin gauge theories via the AdS/CFT-correspondence. The tensionless superstring in a plane wave background, arising as a particular limit of the near-horizon geometry of a stack of D3-branes, is considered and compared to the tensile case.</p>

<p>The main topic of this doctoral thesis is D-branes in string theory, expressed in the language of conformal field theory. The purpose of string theory is to describe the elementary particles and the fundamental interactions of nature, including gravitation as a quantum theory. String theory has not yet reached the status to make falsifiable predictions, thus it is not certain that string theory has any direct relevance to physics. On the other hand, string theory related research has led to progress in mathematics.</p><p>We begin with a short introduction to conformal field theory and some of its applications to string theory. We also introduce vertex algebras and discuss their relevance to conformal field theory. Some classes of conformal field theories are introduced, and we discuss the relevant vertex algebras, as well as their interpretation in terms of string theory.</p><p>In string theory, a D-brane specifies where the endpoint of the string lives. Many aspects of string theory can be described in terms of a conformal field theory, which is a field theory that lives on a two-dimensional space. The conformal field theory counterpart of a D-brane is a boundary state, which in some cases has a natural interpretation as constraining the string end point. The main focus of this thesis is on the interpretation of boundary states in terms of D-branes in curved target spaces.</p>