M Theory Fivebrane and Confining Phase of N=1 $SO(N_c)$ Gauge Theories

TL;DR

This paper uses M theory fivebrane configurations to analyze the confining phase of N=1 SO(N_c) supersymmetric gauge theories, revealing the structure of vacua and the nature of singular points.

Contribution

It constructs M theory fivebrane configurations for N=1 SO(N_c) theories and relates singularities to vacua, providing an exact superpotential comparison with field theory.

Findings

Identification of vacua via M theory fivebrane analysis

Relation of singular points to N=1 vacua

Validation of superpotential from field theory

Abstract

The moduli space of vacua for the confining phase of N=1 $SO(N_c)$ supersymmetric gauge theories in four dimensions is analyzed by studying the M theory fivebrane. The type IIA brane configuration consists of a single NS5 brane, multiple copies of NS'5 branes, D4 branes between them, and D6 branes intersecting D4 branes. We construct M theory fivebrane configuration corresponding to the superpotential perturbation where the power of adjoint field is connected to the number of NS'5 branes. At a singular point in the moduli space where mutually local dyons become massless, the quadratic degeneracy of the N=2 $SO(N_c)$ hyperelliptic curve determines whether this singular point gives a N=1 vacua or not. The comparison of the meson vevs in M theory fivebrane configuration with field theory results turns out that the effective superpotential by the integrating in method with enhanced gauge group SU(2) is exact.