de Sitter extrema and the swampland

TL;DR

This paper investigates the existence of de Sitter extrema in string theory compactifications, revisiting known solutions and discovering new ones to test the validity of the de Sitter swampland conjecture.

Contribution

It provides a detailed analysis of classical type II string compactifications with fluxes, D-branes, and O-planes, offering new de Sitter solutions and assessing their implications for the swampland conjecture.

Findings

Revisited and confirmed previous de Sitter critical points.

Constructed numerous new de Sitter solutions.

Evaluated their impact on the de Sitter swampland conjecture.

Abstract

Recently it has been conjectured that string theory does not allow for dS vacua or dS extrema. To scrutinize such a conjecture, it is important to study concrete string theory compactifications and spell out their assumptions and potential shortcomings. We do so for one particular class of string compactifications, namely classical compactifications of type II string theory with fluxes, D-branes and O-planes on manifolds with SU(3) structure. In particular, we revisit previously found dS critical points, construct many new ones and check whether they invalidate the dS swampland conjecture.