Heterotic String Theory on non-Kaehler Manifolds with H-Flux and Gaugino Condensate

We discuss compactifications of heterotic string theory to four dimensions in the presence of H-fluxes, which deform the geometry of the internal manifold, and a gaugino condensate which breaks supersymmetry. We focus on the compensation of the two effects in order to obtain vacua with zero cosmological constant and we comment on the effective superpotential describing these vacua.Comment: 6 page

Duality Symmetries and Supersymmetry Breaking in String Compactifications

We discuss the spontaneous supersymetry breaking within the low-energy effective supergravity action of four-dimensional superstrings. In particular, we emphasize the non-universality of the soft supersymmetry breaking parameters, the $\mu$-problem and the duality symmetries.Comment: (invited talk to the 27th ICHEP, Glasgow, July 1994), 11 page

The world-sheet corrections to dyons in the Heterotic theory

All the linear alpha-prime corrections, however excluding the gravitational Chern-Simons correction, are studied in the toroidally compactified critical Heterotic string theory. These corrections are computed to the entropy for a BPS static spherical four dimensional dyonic black hole which represents a wrapped fundamental string carrying arbitrary winding and momentum charges along one cycle in the presence of KK-monopole and H-monopole charges associated to another cycle. It is verified that after the inclusion of the gravitational Chern-Simons corrections [hep-th/0608182], all the linear alpha-prime corrections to the entropy for the supersymmetric dyon can be reproduced by the inclusion of only the Gauss-Bonnet Lagrangian to the supergravity approximation of the induced Lagrangian.Comment: JHEP style, 17 Pages; v2: a typo corrected ; v3: The coupling of the gravitational Chern-Simons terms to the three form field strength taken into account. The conclusion correcte

BPS Action and Superpotential for Heterotic String Compactifications with Fluxes

We consider N =1 compactifications to four dimensions of heterotic string theory in the presence of fluxes. We show that up to order O(\alpha'^2) the associated action can be written as a sum of squares of BPS-like quantities. In this way we prove that the equations of motion are solved by backgrounds which fulfill the supersymmetry conditions and the Bianchi identities. We also argue for the expression of the related superpotential and discuss the radial modulus stabilization for a class of examples.Comment: LaTeX, 28 pages. Minor changes, one more reference added. Final version to appear on JHE

Black hole entropy functions and attractor equations

The entropy and the attractor equations for static extremal black hole solutions follow from a variational principle based on an entropy function. In the general case such an entropy function can be derived from the reduced action evaluated in a near-horizon geometry. BPS black holes constitute special solutions of this variational principle, but they can also be derived directly from a different entropy function based on supersymmetry enhancement at the horizon. Both functions are consistent with electric/magnetic duality and for BPS black holes their corresponding OSV-type integrals give identical results at the semi-classical level. We clarify the relation between the two entropy functions and the corresponding attractor equations for N=2 supergravity theories with higher-derivative couplings in four space-time dimensions. We discuss how non-holomorphic corrections will modify these entropy functions.Comment: 21 pages,LaTeX,minor change

Partition functions and elliptic genera from supergravity

We develop the spacetime aspects of the computation of partition functions for string/M-theory on AdS(3) xM. Subleading corrections to the semi-classical result are included systematically, laying the groundwork for comparison with CFT partition functions via the AdS(3)/CFT(2) correspondence. This leads to a better understanding of the "Farey tail" expansion of Dijkgraaf et. al. from the point of view of bulk physics. Besides clarifying various issues, we also extend the analysis to the N=2 setting with higher derivative effects included.Comment: 34 page

Nernst branes from special geometry

We construct new black brane solutions in $U(1)$ gauged ${\cal N}=2$ supergravity with a general cubic prepotential, which have entropy density $s\sim T^{1/3}$ as $T \rightarrow 0$ and thus satisfy the Nernst Law. By using the real formulation of special geometry, we are able to obtain analytical solutions in closed form as functions of two parameters, the temperature $T$ and the chemical potential $\mu$. Our solutions interpolate between hyperscaling violating Lifshitz geometries with $(z,\theta)=(0,2)$ at the horizon and $(z,\theta)=(1,-1)$ at infinity. In the zero temperature limit, where the entropy density goes to zero, we recover the extremal Nernst branes of Barisch et al, and the parameters of the near horizon geometry change to $(z,\theta)=(3,1)$.Comment: 37 pages. v2: numerical pre-factors of scalar fields q_A corrected in Section 3. No changes to conclusions. References adde

Entropy Function for Heterotic Black Holes

We use the entropy function formalism to study the effect of the Gauss-Bonnet term on the entropy of spherically symmetric extremal black holes in heterotic string theory in four dimensions. Surprisingly the resulting entropy and the near horizon metric, gauge field strengths and the axion-dilaton field are identical to those obtained by Cardoso et. al. for a supersymmetric version of the theory that contains Weyl tensor squared term instead of the Gauss-Bonnet term. We also study the effect of holomorphic anomaly on the entropy using our formalism. Again the resulting attractor equations for the axion-dilaton field and the black hole entropy agree with the corresponding equations for the supersymmetric version of the theory. These results suggest that there might be a simpler description of supergravity with curvature squared terms in which we supersymmetrize the Gauss-Bonnet term instead of the Weyl tensor squared term.Comment: LaTeX file, 23 pages; v2: references added; v3: minor addition; v4: minor change

Quasinormal modes of d-dimensional spherical black holes with a near extreme cosmological constant

We derive an expression for the quasinormal modes of scalar perturbations in near extreme d-dimensional Schwarzschild-de Sitter and Reissner-Nordstrom-de Sitter black holes. We show that, in the near extreme limit, the dynamics of the scalar field is characterized by a Poschl-Teller effective potential. The results are qualitatively independent of the spacetime dimension and field mass.Comment: 5 pages, REVTeX4, version to be published in Physical Review