More Dual Fluxes and Moduli Fixing

TL;DR

This paper extends the understanding of fluxes in string compactifications by incorporating duality invariances, leading to new flux classes and stable vacua with all moduli fixed, suggesting richer underlying structures.

Contribution

It introduces new fluxes required by S-duality invariance, broadening the landscape of flux compactifications and moduli stabilization in string theory.

Findings

New superpotential terms from S-duality invariance.

Existence of Minkowski vacua fixing all moduli.

Identification of additional flux degrees of freedom.

Abstract

We generalize the recent proposal that invariance under T-duality leads to additional non-geometric fluxes required so that superpotentials in type IIA and type IIB orientifolds match. We show that invariance under type IIB S-duality requires the introduction of a new set of fluxes leading to further superpotential terms. We find new classes of N=1 supersymmetric Minkowski vacua based on type IIB toroidal orientifolds in which not only dilaton and complex moduli but also Kahler moduli are fixed. The chains of dualities relating type II orientifolds to heterotic and M-theory compactifications suggests the existence of yet further flux degrees of freedom. Restricting to a particular type IIA/IIB or heterotic compactification only some of these degrees of freedom have a simple perturbative and/or geometric interpretation.