Constructing Nongeometric Vacua in String Theory

TL;DR

This paper explores nongeometric string compactifications with duality twists, constructing explicit backgrounds that project out moduli and serve as spacetime realizations of asymmetric orbifolds, advancing understanding of string vacua.

Contribution

It provides explicit constructions of nongeometric vacua with duality monodromies in type II and heterotic strings, linking them to asymmetric orbifolds.

Findings

Moduli are projected out in these backgrounds

Constructed explicit nongeometric string backgrounds

Linked nongeometric backgrounds to asymmetric orbifolds

Abstract

In this paper we investigate compactifications of the type II and heterotic string on four-dimensional spaces with nongeometric monodromies. We explicitly construct backgrounds which contain the "Duality Twists" discussed by Dabholkar and Hull. Similar constructions of nongeometric backgrounds have been discussed for type II strings by Hellerman, McGreevy, and Williams. We find that imposing such monodromies projects out many moduli from the resulting vacua and argue that these backgrounds are the spacetime realizations of interpolating asymmetric orbifolds.