Constraining cosmic superstrings with dilaton emission

TL;DR

This paper investigates how dilaton emission from cosmic superstrings constrains their evolution and impacts the detectability of gravitational wave bursts, suggesting smaller loop sizes are necessary for detection.

Contribution

It demonstrates that dilaton emission imposes strict limits on cosmic superstring network evolution and affects gravitational wave detection prospects.

Findings

Dilaton emission constrains superstring network evolution.

Detection of gravitational waves requires smaller string loops.

Severe constraints on superstring models from dilaton emission.

Abstract

Brane inflation predicts the production of cosmic superstrings with tension 10^{-12}<G\mu<10^{-7}. Superstring theory predicts also the existence of a dilaton with a mass that is at most of the order of the gravitino mass. We show that the emission of dilatons imposes severe constraints on the allowed evolution of a cosmic superstring network. In particular, the detection of gravitational wave burst from cosmic superstrings by LIGO is only possible if the typical length of string loops is much smaller than usually assumed.