299 research outputs found
D-Brane Dynamics and NS5 Rings
We consider the classical motion of a probe D-brane moving in the background
geometry of a ring of NS5 branes, assuming that the latter are non-dynamical.
We analyse the solutions to the Dirac-Born-Infield (DBI) action governing the
approximate dynamics of the system. In the near horizon (throat) approximation
we find several exact solutions for the probe brane motion. These are compared
to numerical solutions obtained in more general cases. One solution of
particular interest is when the probe undergoes oscillatory motion through the
centre of the ring (and perpendicular to it). By taking the ring radius
sufficiently large, this solution should remain stable to any stringy
corrections coming from open-strings stretching between the probe and the
NS5-branes along the ring.Comment: 17 pages, Latex, 8 figures; References adde
The Shape of Gravity in a Warped Deformed Conifold
We study the spectrum of the gravitational modes in Minkowski spacetime due
to a 6-dimensional warped deformed conifold, i.e., a warped throat, in
superstring theory. After identifying the zero mode as the usual 4D graviton,
we present the KK spectrum as well as other excitation modes. Gluing the throat
to the bulk (a realistic scenario), we see that the graviton has a rather
uniform probability distribution everywhere while a KK mode is peaked in the
throat, as expected. Due to the suppressed measure of the throat in the wave
function normalization, we find that a KK mode's probability in the bulk can be
comparable to that of the graviton mode. We also present the tunneling
probabilities of a KK mode from the inflationary throat to the bulk and to
another throat. Due to resonance effect, the latter may not be suppressed as
natively expected. Implication of this property to reheating after brane
inflation is discussed
The Nociceptin/Orphanin FQ Receptor Antagonist UFP-101 Reduces Microvascular Inflammation to Lipopolysaccharide In Vivo
Microvascular inflammation occurs during sepsis and the endogenous opioid-like peptide nociceptin/orphanin FQ (N/OFQ) is known to regulate inflammation. This study aimed to determine the inflammatory role of N/OFQ and its receptor NOP (ORL1) within the microcirculation, along with anti-inflammatory effects of the NOP antagonist UFP-101 (University of Ferrara Peptide-101) in an animal model of sepsis (endotoxemia).
Male Wistar rats (220 to 300 g) were administered lipopolysaccharide (LPS) for 24 h (-24 h, 1 mg kg-1; -2 h, 1 mg kg-1 i.v., tail vein). They were then either anesthetised for observation of the mesenteric microcirculation using fluorescent in vivo microscopy, or isolated arterioles (~200 µm) were studied in vitro with pressure myography.
200 nM kg-1 fluorescently labelled N/OFQ (FITC-N/OFQ, i.a., mesenteric artery) bound to specific sites on the microvascular endothelium in vivo, indicating sparse distribution of NOP receptors. In vitro, arterioles (~200 µm) dilated to intraluminal N/OFQ (10-5M) (32.6 + 8.4%) and this response was exaggerated with LPS (62.0 +7.9%, p=0.031). In vivo, LPS induced macromolecular leak of FITC-BSA (0.02 g kg-1 i.v.) (LPS: 95.3 (86.7 to 97.9)%, p=0.043) from post-capillary venules (<40 µm) and increased leukocyte rolling as endotoxemia progressed (p=0.027), both being reduced by 150 nmol kg-1 UFP-101 (i.v., jugular vein).
Firstly, the rat mesenteric microcirculation expresses NOP receptors and secondly, NOP function (ability to induce dilation) is enhanced with LPS. UFP-101 also reduced microvascular inflammation to endotoxemia in vivo. Hence inhibition of the microvascular N/OFQ-NOP pathway may have therapeutic potential during sepsis and warrants further investigation
Warped Tachyonic Inflation in Type IIB Flux Compactifications and the Open-String Completeness Conjecture
We consider a cosmological scenario within the KKLT framework for moduli
stabilization in string theory. The universal open string tachyon of decaying
non-BPS D-brane configurations is proposed to drive eternal topological
inflation. Flux-induced `warping' can provide the small slow-roll parameters
needed for successful inflation. Constraints on the parameter space leading to
sufficient number of e-folds, exit from inflation, density perturbations and
stabilization of the Kahler modulus are investigated. The conditions are
difficult to satisfy in Klebanov-Strassler throats but can be satisfied in T^3
fibrations and other generic Calabi-Yau manifolds. This requires large volume
and magnetic fluxes on the D-brane. The end of inflation may or may not lead to
cosmic strings depending on the original non-BPS configuration. A careful
investigation of initial conditions leading to a phenomenologically viable
model for inflation is carried out. The initial conditions are chosen on the
basis of Sen's open string completeness conjecture. We find time symmetrical
bounce solutions without initial singularities for k=1 FRW models which are
correlated with an inflationary period. Singular big-bang/big-crunch solutions
also exist but do not lead to inflation. There is an intriguing correlation
between having an inflationary universe in 4 dimensions and 6 compact
dimensions or a big-crunch singularity and decompactification.Comment: 43 pages, 9 figures. v3: Typos correcte
Inflation from Warped Space
A long period of inflation can be triggered when the inflaton is held up on
the top of a steep potential by the infrared end of a warped space. We first
study the field theory description of such a model. We then embed it in the
flux stabilized string compactification. Some special effects in the throat
reheating process by relativistic branes are discussed. We put all these
ingredients into a multi-throat brane inflationary scenario. The resulting
cosmic string tension and a multi-throat slow-roll model are also discussed.Comment: 39 pages; v4, added reference, to appear in JHE
Warped Reheating in Multi-Throat Brane Inflation
We investigate in some quantitative details the viability of reheating in
multi-throat brane inflationary scenarios by estimating and comparing the time
scales for the various processes involved. We also calculate within
perturbative string theory the decay rate of excited closed strings into KK
modes and compare with that of their decay into gravitons; we find that in the
inflationary throat the former is preferred. We also find that over a small but
reasonable range of parameters of the background geometry, these KK modes will
preferably tunnel to another throat (possibly containing the Standard Model)
instead of decaying to gravitons due largely to their suppressed coupling to
the bulk gravitons. Once tunneled, the same suppressed coupling to the
gravitons again allows them to reheat the Standard Model efficiently. We also
consider the effects of adding more throats to the system and find that for
extra throats with small warping, reheating still seems viable.Comment: 29 pages, 4 figures, discussions on closed string decay expanded,
references adde
Caustic Formation in Tachyon Effective Field Theories
Certain configurations of D-branes, for example wrong dimensional branes or
the brane-antibrane system, are unstable to decay. This instability is
described by the appearance of a tachyonic mode in the spectrum of open strings
ending on the brane(s). The decay of these unstable systems is described by the
rolling of the tachyon field from the unstable maximum to the minimum of its
potential. We analytically study the dynamics of the inhomogeneous tachyon
field as it rolls towards the true vacuum of the theory in the context of
several different tachyon effective actions. We find that the vacuum dynamics
of these theories is remarkably similar and in particular we show that in all
cases the tachyon field forms caustics where second and higher derivatives of
the field blow up. The formation of caustics signals a pathology in the
evolution since each of the effective actions considered is not reliable in the
vicinity of a caustic. We speculate that the formation of caustics is an
artifact of truncating the tachyon action, which should contain all orders of
derivatives acting on the field, to a finite number of derivatives. Finally, we
consider inhomogeneous solutions in p-adic string theory, a toy model of the
bosonic tachyon which contains derivatives of all orders acting on the field.
For a large class of initial conditions we conclusively show that the evolution
is well behaved in this case. It is unclear if these caustics are a genuine
prediction of string theory or not.Comment: 23 pages, 5 figures; accepted for publication in JHEP. Revised
derivation of eikonal equation for the DBI action. Added comments concerning
the relationship between p-adic string theory and tachyon matter. Added
second example of inhomogeneous evolution in p-adic string theory. Misleading
statements concerning caustic-free evolution removed, references adde
Geometrical Tachyon Kinks and NS5 Branes
We further investigate the 5 ring background using the tachyon map.
Mapping the radion fields to the rolling tachyon helps to explain the motion of
a probe -brane in this background. It turns out that the radion field
becomes tachyonic when the brane is confined to one dimensional motion inside
the ring. We find explicit solutions for the geometrical tachyon field that
describe stable kink solutions which are similar to those of the open string
tachyon. Interestingly in the case of the geometric tachyon, the dynamics is
controlled by a cosine potential. In addition, we couple a constant electric
field to the probe-brane, but find that the only stable kink solutions occur
when there is zero electric field or a critical field value. We also
investigate the behaviour of Non-BPS branes in this background, and find that
the end state of any probe brane is that of tachyonic matter 'trapped' around
the interior of the ring. We conclude by considering compactification of the
ring solution in one of the transverse directions.Comment: Latex, 24 pages, 1 eps fig; clarifying comments added to Section 2;
typos correcte
Overproduction of cosmic superstrings
We show that the naive application of the Kibble mechanism seriously
underestimates the initial density of cosmic superstrings that can be formed
during the annihilation of D-branes in the early universe, as in models of
brane-antibrane inflation. We study the formation of defects in effective field
theories of the string theory tachyon both analytically, by solving the
equation of motion of the tachyon field near the core of the defect, and
numerically, by evolving the tachyon field on a lattice. We find that defects
generically form with correlation lengths of order M_s^{-1} rather than H^{-1}.
Hence, defects localized in extra dimensions may be formed at the end of
inflation. This implies that brane-antibrane inflation models where inflation
is driven by branes which wrap the compact manifold may have problems with
overclosure by cosmological relics, such as domain walls and monopoles.Comment: 31 pages, 16 figures, JHEP style; References added; Improved
discussion of initial condition
DBI Inflation in the Tip Region of a Warped Throat
Previous work on DBI inflation, which achieves inflation through the motion
of a brane as it moves through a warped throat compactification, has
focused on the region far from the tip of the throat. Since reheating and other
observable effects typically occur near the tip, a more detailed study of this
region is required. To investigate these effects we consider a generalized warp
throat where the warp factor becomes nearly constant near the tip. We find that
it is possible to obtain 60 or more e-folds in the constant region, however
large non-gaussianities are typically produced due to the small sound speed of
fluctuations. For a particular well-studied throat, the Klebanov-Strassler
solution, we find that inflation near the tip may be generic and it is
difficult to satisfy current bounds on non-gaussianity, but other throat
solutions may evade these difficulties.Comment: 26 pages, 1 figure. v1. references added, typos corrected v2.
clarifications mad
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