Planar Gravitational Corrections For Supersymmetric Gauge Theories

In this paper we discuss the contribution of planar diagrams to gravitational F-terms for N=1 supersymmetric gauge theories admitting a large N description. We show how the planar diagrams lead to a universal contribution at the extremum of the glueball superpotential, leaving only the genus one contributions, as was previously conjectured. We also discuss the physical meaning of gravitational F-terms.Comment: 20 pages, 4 figure

Perturbative Computation of Glueball Superpotentials

Using N=1 superspace techniques in four dimensions we show how to perturbatively compute the superpotential generated for the glueball superfield upon integrating out massive charged fields. The technique applies to arbitrary gauge groups and representations. Moreover we show that for U(N) gauge theories admitting a large N expansion the computation dramatically simplifies and we prove the validity of the recently proposed recipe for computation of this quantity in terms of planar diagrams of matrix integrals.Comment: 15 Pages, 2 Figure

Topological Phase Transitions and Holonomies in the Dimer Model

We demonstrate that the classical dimer model defined on a toroidal hexagonal lattice acquires holonomy phases in the thermodynamic limit. When all activities are equal the lattice sizes must be considered mod 6 in which case the finite size corrections to the bulk partition function correspond to a massless Dirac Fermion in the presence of a flat connection with nontrivial holonomy. For general bond activities we find that the phase transition in this model is a topological one, where the torus degenerates and its modular parameter becomes real at the critical temperature. We argue that these features are generic to bipartite dimer models and we present a more general lattice whose continuum partition function is that of a massive Dirac Fermion.Comment: 7 pages, 4 figures. Minor corrections with additional figure

Black Holes and Large Order Quantum Geometry

We study five-dimensional black holes obtained by compactifying M theory on Calabi-Yau threefolds. Recent progress in solving topological string theory on compact, one-parameter models allows us to test numerically various conjectures about these black holes. We give convincing evidence that a microscopic description based on Gopakumar-Vafa invariants accounts correctly for their macroscopic entropy, and we check that highly nontrivial cancellations -which seem necessary to resolve the so-called entropy enigma in the OSV conjecture- do in fact occur. We also study analytically small 5d black holes obtained by wrapping M2 branes in the fiber of K3 fibrations. By using heterotic/type II duality we obtain exact formulae for the microscopic degeneracies in various geometries, and we compute their asymptotic expansion for large charges.Comment: 42 pages, 20 eps figures, small correction

Gravitational corrections in supersymmetric gauge theory and matrix models

Gravitational corrections in N=1 and N=2 supersymmetric gauge theories are obtained from topological string amplitudes. We show how they are recovered in matrix model computations. This provides a test of the proposal by Dijkgraaf and Vafa beyond the planar limit. Both, matrix model and topological string theory, are used to check a conjecture of Nekrasov concerning these gravitational couplings in Seiberg-Witten theory. Our analysis is performed for those gauge theories which are related to the cubic matrix model, i.e. pure SU(2) Seiberg-Witten theory and N=2 U(N) SYM broken to N=1 via a cubic superpotential. We outline the computation of the topological amplitudes for the local Calabi-Yau manifolds which are relevant for these two cases.Comment: 27 pages, one eps figur

Superpotentials from flux compactifications of M-theory

In flux compactifications of M-theory a superpotential is generated whose explicit form depends on the structure group of the 7-dimensional internal manifold. In this note, we discuss superpotentials for the structure groups: G_2, SU(3) or SU(2). For the G_2 case all internal fluxes have to vanish. For SU(3) structures, the non-zero flux components entering the superpotential describe an effective 1-dimensional model and a Chern-Simons model if there are SU(2) structures.Comment: 10 page

The M5-Brane Elliptic Genus: Modularity and BPS States

The modified elliptic genus for an M5-brane wrapped on a four-cycle of a Calabi-Yau threefold encodes the degeneracies of an infinite set of BPS states in four dimensions. By holomorphy and modular invariance, it can be determined completely from the knowledge of a finite set of such BPS states. We show the feasibility of such a computation and determine the exact modified elliptic genus for an M5-brane wrapping a hyperplane section of the quintic threefold.Comment: 21 page

Supersymmetric Gauge Theories, Intersecting Branes and Free Fermions

We show that various holomorphic quantities in supersymmetric gauge theories can be conveniently computed by configurations of D4-branes and D6-branes. These D-branes intersect along a Riemann surface that is described by a holomorphic curve in a complex surface. The resulting I-brane carries two-dimensional chiral fermions on its world-volume. This system can be mapped directly to the topological string on a large class of non-compact Calabi-Yau manifolds. Inclusion of the string coupling constant corresponds to turning on a constant B-field on the complex surface, which makes this space non-commutative. Including all string loop corrections the free fermion theory is elegantly formulated in terms of holonomic D-modules that replace the classical holomorphic curve in the quantum case.Comment: 67 pages, 6 figure

Polynomial rings of the chiral SU(N)2SU(N)_{2} models

Via explicit diagonalization of the chiral $SU(N)_{2}$ fusion matrices, we discuss the possibility of representing the fusion ring of the chiral SU(N) models, at level K=2, by a polynomial ring in a single variable when $N$ is odd and by a polynomial ring in two variables when $N$ is even.Comment: 10 pages, LaTex (ioplppt.sty