1,720,975 research outputs found
String loop moduli stabilisation and cosmology in IIB flux compactifications
No full textWe present a detailed review of the moduli stabilisation mechanism and possible cosmological implications of the LARGE Volume Scenario (LVS) that emerges naturally in the context of type IIB Calabi-Yau flux compactifications. After a quick overview of physics beyond the Standard Model, we present string theory as the most promising candidate for a consistent theory of quantum gravity. We then give a pedagogical introduction to type IIB compactifications on Calabi-Yau orientifolds where most of the moduli are stabilised by turning on background fluxes. However in order to fix the Kahler moduli one needs to consider several corrections beyond the leading order approximations. After presenting a survey of all the existing solutions to this problem, we derive the topological conditions on an arbitrary Calabi-Yau to obtain the LVS since it requires no fine-tuning of the fluxes and provides a natural solution of the hierarchy problem. After performing a systematic study of the behaviour of string loop corrections for general type IIB compactifications, we show how they play a crucial role to achieve full Kahler moduli stabilisation in the LVS. Before examining the possible cosmological implication of these scenarios, we present a broad overview of string cosmology. We then notice how, in the case of K3-fibrations, string loop corrections give rise naturally to an inflationary model which yields observable gravity waves. We finally study the finite-temperature behaviour of the LVS and discuss prospects for future work
Anisotropic Modulus Stabilisation: Strings at LHC Scales with Micron-sized Extra Dimensions
Get PDFWe construct flux-stabilised Type IIB string compactifications whose extra dimensions have very different sizes, and use these to describe several types of vacua with a TeV string scale. Because we can access regimes where two dimensions are hierarchically larger than the other four, we find examples where two dimensions are micron-sized while
the other four are at the weak scale in addition to more standard examples with all six extra dimensions equally large. Besides providing ultraviolet completeness, the phenomenology of these models is richer than vanilla large-dimensional models in several generic ways: (i)
they are supersymmetric, with supersymmetry broken at sub-eV scales in the bulk but only nonlinearly realised in the Standard Model sector, leading to no MSSM superpartners for ordinary particles and many more bulk missing-energy channels, as in supersymmetric large extra dimensions (SLED); (ii) small cycles in the more complicated extra-dimensional geometry allow some KK states to reside at TeV scales even if all six extra dimensions are nominally much larger; (iii) a rich spectrum of string and KK states at TeV scales; and (iv) an equally rich spectrum of very light moduli exist having unusually small (but technically natural) masses, with potentially interesting implications for cosmology and astrophysics that nonetheless evade new-force constraints. The hierarchy problem is solved in these models because the extra-dimensional volume is naturally stabilised at exponentially large values: the extra dimensions are Calabi-Yau geometries with a 4D K3 or T^4-fibration over a 2D base, with moduli stabilised within the well-established LARGE-Volume scenario. The new technical step is the use of poly-instanton corrections to the superpotential (which, unlike for simpler models, are likely to be present on K3 or T^4-fibered Calabi-Yau compactifications) to obtain a large hierarchy between the sizes of different dimensions. For several scenarios we identify the low-energy spectrum and briefly discuss some of their astrophysical, cosmological and phenomenological implications
String inflation after Planck 2013
No full textWe briefly summarize the impact of the recent Planck measurements for string inflationary models, and outline what might be expected to be learned in the near future from the expected improvement in sensitivity to the primordial tensor-to-scalar ratio. We comment on whether these models provide sufficient added value to compensate for their complexity, and ask how they fare in the face of the new constraints on non-gaussianity and dark radiation. We argue that as a group the predictions made before Planck agree well with what has been seen, and draw conclusions from this about what is likely to mean as sensitivity to primordial gravitational waves improves
Modulated reheating and large non-gaussianity in string cosmology
Get PDFA generic feature of the known string inflationary models is that the same physics that makes the inflaton lighter than the Hubble scale during inflation often also makes other scalars this light. These scalars can acquire isocurvature fluctuations during inflation, and given that their VEVs determine the mass spectrum and the coupling constants of the effective low-energy field theory, these fluctuations give rise to couplings and masses that are modulated from one Hubble patch to another. These seem just what is required to obtain primordial adiabatic fluctuations through Con Version into density perturbations through the 'modulation mechanism', wherein reheating takes place with different efficiency in different regions of our Universe. Fluctuations generated in this way can generically produce non-gaussianity larger than obtained in single-field slow-roll inflation; potentially observable in the near future. We provide here the first explicit example of the modulation mechanism at work in string cosmology, within the framework of LARGE Volume Type-IIB string flux compactifications. The inflationary dynamics involves two light Kahler moduli: a fibre divisor plays the role of the inflaton whose decay rate to visible sector degrees of freedom is modulated by the primordial fluctuations of a blow-up mode (which is made light by the use of poly-instanton corrections). We find the challenges of embedding the mechanism into a concrete UV completion constrains the properties of the non-gaussianity that is found, since for generic values of the underlying parameters, the model predicts a local bi-spectrum with f(NL), of order 'a few'. However, a moderate tuning of the parameters gives also rise to explicit examples with f(NL) similar to O(20) potentially observable by the Planck satellite
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Get PDFThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
Variations on the Author
Get PDF“Variations on the Author” discusses two of Eduardo Coutinho’s recent films (Um Dia na Vida, from 2010, and Últimas Conversas, posthumously released in 2015) and their contribution to the general question of documentary authorship. The director’s filmography is characterized by a consistent yet self-effacing form of authorial self-inscription: Coutinho often features as an interviewer that rather than express opinions propels discourses; an interviewer that is good at listening. This mode of self-inscription characterizes him as an author who is not expressive but who is nonetheless markedly present on the screen. In Um Dia na Vida, however, Coutinho is completely absent form the image, while Últimas Conversas, on the contrary, includes a confessional prologue that moves the director from the margins to the center of his films. This article examines the ways in which these works stand out in the filmography of a director who offers new insights into the notion of cinematic authorship
Appropriate Similarity Measures for Author Cocitation Analysis
Get PDFWe provide a number of new insights into the methodological discussion about author cocitation analysis. We first argue that the use of the Pearson correlation for measuring the similarity between authors’ cocitation profiles is not very satisfactory. We then discuss what kind of similarity measures may be used as an alternative to the Pearson correlation. We consider three similarity measures in particular. One is the well-known cosine. The other two similarity measures have not been used before in the bibliometric literature. Finally, we show by means of an example that our findings have a high practical relevance.information science;Pearson correlation;cosine;similarity measure;author cocitation analysis
Heterotic Moduli Stabilization
Get PDFWe perform a systematic analysis of moduli stabilization for weakly coupled heterotic string theory compactified on smooth Calabi-Yau three-folds. We focus on both supersymmetric and supersymmetry breaking vacua of generic (0,2) compactifications obtained by minimising the total (F + D)-term scalar potential. After reviewing how to stabilise all the geometric moduli in a supersymmetric way by including fractional fluxes, non-perturbative and threshold effects, we show that the inclusion of \alpha' corrections leads to new de Sitter or nearly Minkowski vacua which break supersymmetry spontaneously. The minimum lies at moderately large volumes of all the geometric moduli, at perturbative values of the string coupling and at the right phenomenological value of the GUT gauge coupling. However the structure of the heterotic 3-form flux used for complex structure moduli stabilization does not contain enough freedom to tune the superpotential. This results in the generic prediction of high-scale supersymmetry breaking around the GUT scale. We finally provide a dynamical derivation of anisotropic compactifications with stabilized moduli which allow for perturbative gauge coupling unification around 10^16 GeV
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