D-branes on Nonabelian Threefold Quotient Singularities

We present a general method for calculating the moduli spaces of fivebranes wrapped on holomorphic curves in elliptically fibered Calabi-Yau threefolds, in particular, in the context of heterotic M theory. The cases of fivebranes wrapped purely on a fiber curve, purely on a curve in the base and, generically, on a curve with components both in the fiber and the base are each discussed in detail. The number of irreducible components of the fivebrane and their properties, such ...

The moduli space of multiply-connected Calabi-Yau threefolds is shown to contain codimension-one loci on which the corresponding variety develops a certain type of hyperquotient singularity. These have local descriptions as discrete quotients of the conifold, and are referred to here as hyperconifolds. In many (or possibly all) cases such a singularity can be resolved to yield a distinct compact Calabi-Yau manifold. These considerations therefore provide a method for embeddin...

We consider D4-branes on toric Calabi-Yau spaces. The quiver gauge theory that describes several D4-branes on the Calabi-Yau has a Higgs branch, that describes configurations of a single large D4-brane with the same charges. We propose that the world volume of such a D4-brane is described by a determinantal variety. We discuss a description of the Higgs branch of the moduli space in terms of a quiver with twice as many nodes and only bifundamental fields, arising from a $D6-\...

In this work, the moduli of D7-branes in type IIB orientifold compactifications and their stabilization by fluxes is studied from the perspective of F-theory. In F-theory, the moduli of the D7-branes and the moduli of the orientifold are unified in the moduli space of an elliptic Calabi-Yau manifold. This makes it possible to study the flux stabilization of D7-branes in an elegant manner. To answer phenomenological questions, one has to translate the deformations of the ellip...

An important subclass of D-branes on a Calabi-Yau manifold, X, are in 1-1 correspondence with objects in D(X), the derived category of coherent sheaves on X. We study the action of the monodromies in Kaehler moduli space on these D-branes. We refine and extend a conjecture of Kontsevich about the form of one of the generators of these monodromies (the monodromy about the "conifold" locus) and show that one can do quite explicit calculations of the monodromy action in many exa...

We demonstrate a practical and efficient method for generating toric Calabi-Yau quiver theories, applicable to both D3 and M2 brane world-volume physics. A new analytic method is presented at low order parametres and an algorithm for the general case is developed which has polynomial complexity in the number of edges in the quiver. Using this algorithm, carefully implemented, we classify the quiver diagram and assign possible superpotentials for various small values of the nu...

We show how to compute terms in an expansion of the world-volume superpotential for fairly general D-branes on the quintic Calabi-Yau using linear sigma model techniques, and show in examples that this superpotential captures the geometry and obstruction theory of bundles and sheaves on this Calabi-Yau.

Fractional branes added to a large stack of D3-branes at the singularity of a Calabi-Yau cone modify the quiver gauge theory breaking conformal invariance and leading to different kinds of IR behaviors. For toric singularities admitting complex deformations we propose a simple method that allows to compute the anomaly free rank distributions in the gauge theory corresponding to the fractional deformation branes. This algorithm fits Altmann's rule of decomposition of the toric...

We consider D-branes on an orbifold $C^3/Z_n$ and investigate the moduli space of the D-brane world-volume gauge theory by using toric geometry and gauged linear sigma models. For $n=11$, we find that there are five phases, which are topologically distinct and connected by flops to each other. We also verify that non-geometric phases are projected out for $n=7,9,11$ cases as expected. Resolutions of non-isolated singularities are also investigated.

The possibility of having discrete degrees of freedom at singularities associated to `conifolds with discrete torsion' is studied. We find that the field theory of D-brane probes near these singularities is identical to ordinary conifolds, so that there are no additional discrete degrees of freedom located at the singularity. We shed light on how the obstructions to resolving the singularity are global topological issues rather that local obstrucions at the singularity itself...