Quantum Description for the Decay of NSNS Brane-Antibrane Systems

TL;DR

This paper extends the quantum understanding of instabilities from RR-charged brane-antibrane pairs to NSNS-charged systems like F1 and NS5, using string dualities and M-theory insights.

Contribution

It uncovers the stringy nature of instabilities in NSNS-charged brane-antibrane systems through dualities, extending Sen's conjecture.

Findings

Quantum description for NSNS brane-antibrane instabilities established

String dualities connect RR and NSNS system descriptions

Extensions of Sen's conjecture to NSNS systems proposed

Abstract

The stringy description for the instabilities in the $RR$ charged $D_{p}-\bar{D}_{p}$ pairs is now well understood in terms of the open string tachyon condensation. The quantum interpretation presumably via the stringy description for the instabilities in the $NSNS$-charged $F1-\bar{F1}$ and $NS5-\bar{NS5}$ pairs in IIA/IIB theories, however, has not been established yet. This would be partly because of the absence (for the $F1-\bar{F1}$ case) or our relatively poor understanding (for the $NS5-\bar{NS5}$ case) of their worldvolume (gauge theory) dynamics. In the present work, using the well-known quantum description for instabilities in the $RR$-charged $D_{p}-\bar{D}_{p}$ systems and in the M-theory brane-antibrane systems and invoking appropriate string dualities, the stringy nature of the instabilities in the $NSNS$-charged $F1-\bar{F1}$ and $NS5-\bar{NS5}$ systems has been uncovered. For the annihilations to string vacua, the quantum, stringy interpretations are simple extensions of Sen's conjecture for those in $RR$-charged brane-antibrane systems.