Branes in Special Holonomy Backgrounds

We study the flow from the theory of D2-branes in a G2 holonomy background to M2-branes in a Spin(7) holonomy background. We consider in detail the UV and IR regimes, and the effect of topology change of the background on the field theory. We conjecture a non-Abelian N=1 mirror symmetry.Comment: 13 pages, late

Large Spin Strings in AdS_3

We consider strings with large spin in AdS_3xS^3xM with NS-NS background. We construct the string configurations as solutions of SL(2,R) WZW theory. We compute the relation between the space-time energy and spin, and show that the anomalous correction is constant, and not logarithmic in the spin. This is in contrast to the S-dual background with R-R charge where the anomalous correction is logarithmic.Comment: 14 pages, 2 figures, LaTex, added references, to appear in PL

Semiclassical quantization of Rotating Strings in Pilch-Warner geometry

Some of the recent important developments in understanding string/ gauge dualities are based on the idea of highly symmetric motion of ``string solitons'' in $AdS_5\times S^5$ geometry originally suggested by Gubser, Klebanov and Polyakov. In this paper we study symmetric motion of certain string configurations in so called Pilch-Warner geometry. The two-form field $A_2$ breaks down the supersymmetry to $\mathcal{N}=1$ but for the string configurations considered in this paper the classical values of the energy and the spin are the same as for string in $AdS\times S^5$. Although trivial at classical level, the presence of NS-NS antisymmetric field couples the fluctuation modes that indicates changes in the quantum corrections to the energy spectrum. We compare our results with those obtained in the case of pp-wave limit in hep-th/0206045.Comment: 31 pages, no figures, v2 - a few typos correcte

New evidence on the convergence of international income from a group of 29 countries

C32, O40, Growth, Convergence, Convergence clubs, Unit-root tests, Structural breaks,