ADS/CFT String Duality and Conformal Gauge Field Theories

Compactification of Type IIB superstring on an $AdS_5 \times S^5/\Gamma$ background leads to SU(N) gauge field theories with prescribed matter representations. In the 't Hooft limit of large N such theories are conformally finite. For finite N and broken supersymmetry ($\cal N$ = 0) I derive the constraints to be two-loop conformal and examine the consequences for a wide choice of $\Gamma$ and its embedding $\Gamma \subset {\cal C}^3 (\supset S^5)$.Comment: 10 pages LaTe

Predicted modulated differential rates for direct WIMP searches at low energy transfers

The differential event rate for direct detection of dark matter, both the time averaged and the modulated one due to the motion of the Earth, are discussed. The calculations focus on relatively light cold dark matter candidates (WIMP) and low energy transfers. It is shown that for sufficiently light WIMPs the extraction of relatively large nucleon cross sections is possible. Furthermore for some WIMP masses the modulation amplitude may change sign, meaning that, in such a case, the maximum rate may occur six months later than naively expected. This effect can be exploited to yield information about the mass of the dark matter candidate, if and when the observation of the modulation of the event rate is established.Comment: 16 pages, 22 figures; references adde