Restrictions on infinite sequences of type IIB vacua

Ashok and Douglas have shown that infinite sequences of type IIB flux vacua with imaginary self-dual flux can only occur in so-called D-limits, corresponding to singular points in complex structure moduli space. In this work we refine this no-go result by demonstrating that there are no infinite sequences accumulating to the large complex structure point of a certain class of one-parameter Calabi-Yau manifolds. We perform a similar analysis for conifold points and for the decoupling limit, obtaining identical results. Furthermore, we establish the absence of infinite sequences in a D-limit corresponding to the large complex structure limit of a two-parameter Calabi-Yau. In particular, our results demonstrate analytically that the series of vacua recently discovered by Ahlqvist et al., seemingly accumulating to the large complex structure point, are finite. We perform a numerical study of these series close to the large complex structure point using appropriate approximations for the period functions. This analysis reveals that the series bounce out from the large complex structure point, and that the flux eventually ceases to be imaginary self-dual. Finally, we study D-limits for F-theory compactifications on K3\times K3 for which the finiteness of supersymmetric vacua is already established. We do find infinite sequences of flux vacua which are, however, identified by automorphisms of K3.Comment: 35 pages. v2. Typos corrected, ref. added. Matches published versio

PALP - a User Manual

This article provides a complete user's guide to version 2.1 of the toric geometry package PALP by Maximilian Kreuzer and others. In particular, previously undocumented applications such as the program nef.x are discussed in detail. New features of PALP 2.1 include an extension of the program mori.x which can now compute Mori cones and intersection rings of arbitrary dimension and can also take specific triangulations of reflexive polytopes as input. Furthermore, the program nef.x is enhanced by an option that allows the user to enter reflexive Gorenstein cones as input. The present documentation is complemented by a Wiki which is available online.Comment: 71 pages, to appear in "Strings, Gauge Fields, and the Geometry Behind - The Legacy of Maximilian Kreuzer". PALP Wiki available at http://palp.itp.tuwien.ac.at/wiki/index.php/Main_Pag

Bag Formation in Quantum Hall Ferromagnets

Charged skyrmions or spin-textures in the quantum Hall ferromagnet at filling factor nu=1 are reinvestigated using the Hartree-Fock method in the lowest Landau level approximation. It is shown that the single Slater determinant with the minimum energy in the unit charge sector is always of the hedgehog form. It is observed that the magnetization vector's length deviates locally from unity, i.e. a bag is formed which accommodates the excess charge. In terms of a gradient expansion for extended spin-textures a novel O(3) type of effective action is presented, which takes bag formation into account.Comment: 13 pages, 3 figure

The Casimir energy of skyrmions in the 2+1-dimensional O(3)-model

One-loop quantum corrections to the classical vortices in 2+1 dimensional O(3)-models are evaluated. Skyrme and Zeeman potential terms are used to stabilize the size of topological solitons. Contributions from zero modes, bound-states and scattering phase-shifts are calculated for vortices with winding index n=1 and n=2. For both cases the S-matrix shows a pronounced series of resonances for magnon-vortex scattering in analogy to the well-established baryon resonances in hadron physics, while vortices with n>2 are already classically unstable against decay. The quantum corrections destabilize the classically bound n=2 configuration. Approximate independence of the results with respect to changes in the renormalization scale is demonstrated.Comment: 24 pages LaTeX, 14 figure

Hot Nucleons in Chiral Soliton Models

Chiral lagrangians as effective field theories of QCD are most suitable for the study of nucleons in a hot pion gas because they contain pions and also baryons as solitons of the same action. The semiclassical treatment of the soliton solutions must be augmented by pionic fluctuations which requires renormalisation to 1-loop, and finite temperatures do not introduce new ultraviolet divergencies and may easily be considered. Alternatively, a renormalisation scheme based on the renormalisation group equation at finite temperature comprises and extends the rigorous results of chiral perturbation theory and renders the low energy constants temperature-dependent which allows the construction of temperature-dependent solitons below the critical temperature. The temperature-dependence of the baryon energy and the pion-nucleon coupling is studied. There is no simple scaling law for the temperature-dependence of these quantities.Comment: 17 pages (RevTeX), 5 figure

A possible explanation why the Theta+ is seen in some experiments and not in others

To understand the whole set of positive and null data on the Theta+(1530)-production, we suggest the hypothesis that multiquark hadrons are mainly generated from many-quark states, which emerge either as short-term hadron fluctuations, or as hadron remnants in hard processes. This approach allows us to describe both non-observation of the Theta+ in current null experiments and peculiar features of its production in positive experiments. Further, we are able to propose new experiments that might be decisive for the problem of the Theta+ existence. Distributions of the Theta+ in such experiments can give important information both on higher Fock components of conventional hadrons and about structure and hadronization properties of hadron remnants produced in hard processes. We also explain that description of multiquark hadrons may require a modified form of the constituent quark model, with quark masses and couplings being intermediate between their values for the familiar constituent quarks and the current ones.Comment: 18 pages. Some changes in the text; experimental suggestions collected in a special subsection, references added and refreshe

Strangeness, charm and bottom in a chiral quark-meson model

In this paper we investigate an SU(3) extension of the chiral quark-meson model. The spectra of baryons with strangeness, charm and bottom are considered within a "rigid oscillator" version of this model. The similarity between the quark part of the Lagrangian in the model and the Wess-Zumino term in the Skyrme model is noted. The binding energies of baryonic systems with baryon number B=2 and 3 possessing strangeness or heavy flavor are estimated. The results obtained are in good qualitative agreement with those obtained previously in the topological soliton (Skyrme) model.Comment: 12 pages, no figures. Journal ref: submitted to Nucl.Phys.