Moduli stabilization with positive vacuum energy

TL;DR

This paper investigates how anomalous U(1) gauge groups and D-term contributions in string compactifications can uplift AdS vacua to de Sitter space, analyzing the gravitino mass implications and alternative uplifting mechanisms.

Contribution

It introduces a gauge invariant approach to moduli stabilization with fluxes, highlighting the role of D-terms and proposing an alternative Kahler potential correction for realistic gravitino masses.

Findings

D-terms can uplift AdS vacua to de Sitter space.

Gravitino is typically much heavier than the electroweak scale in this setup.

Kahler potential corrections can achieve TeV-scale gravitino mass.

Abstract

We study the effect of anomalous U(1) gauge groups in string theory compactification with fluxes. We find that, in a gauge invariant formulation, consistent AdS vacua appear breaking spontaneously supergravity. Non vanishing D-terms from the anomalous symmetry act as an uplifting potential and could allow for de Sitter vacua. However, we show that in this case the gravitino is generically (but not always) much heavier than the electroweak scale. We show that alternative uplifting scheme based on corrections to the Kahler potential can be compatible with a gravitino mass in the TeV range.