Cusps on cosmic superstrings with junctions

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates the existence of cusps on cosmic superstrings with junctions, analyzes their conditions, and explores their implications for energy loss and phenomenology in cosmic string networks.

Contribution

It introduces the analysis of cusps on cosmic superstrings with junctions and investigates their dynamics and phenomenological consequences.

Findings

Cusps are generic on non-periodic strings ending on D-branes.

FD-string junctions formed after intercommutations contain cusps.

Cusps provide additional energy loss channels in string networks.

Abstract

The existence of cusps on non-periodic strings ending on D-branes is demonstrated and the conditions, for which such cusps are generic, are derived. The dynamics of F-, D-string and FD-string junctions are investigated. It is shown that pairs of FD-string junctions, such as would form after intercommutations of F- and D-strings, generically contain cusps. This new feature of cosmic superstrings opens up the possibility of extra channels of energy loss from a string network. The phenomenology of cusps on such cosmic superstring networks is compared to that of cusps formed on networks of their field theory analogues, the standard cosmic strings.