Tachyonic anti-M2 branes

Iosif Bena (1) , Graña Mariana (1) , Stanislav Kuperstein (1) , Stefano Massai (2)

1 IPHT - Institut de Physique Théorique - UMR CNRS 3681
2 ASC - Arnold Sommerfeld Center for Theoretical Physics [München]

We study the dynamics of anti-M2 branes in a warped Stenzel solution with M2 charges dissolved in fluxes by taking into account their full backreaction on the geometry. The resulting supergravity solution has a singular magnetic four-form flux in the near-brane region. We examine the possible resolution of this singularity via the polarization of anti-M2 branes into M5 branes, and compute the corresponding polarization potential for branes smeared on the finite-size four-sphere at the tip of the Stenzel space. We find that the potential has no minimum. We then use the potential for smeared branes to compute the one corresponding to a stack of localized anti-M2 branes, and use this potential to compute the force between two anti-M2 branes at tip of the Stenzel space. We find that this force, which is zero in the probe approximation, is in fact repulsive. This surprising result points to a tachyonic instability of anti-M2 branes in backgrounds with M2 brane charge dissolved in flux.

Mots clés: Theory (hep-th); High Energy Physics

Domaines: Physique des Hautes Energies - Théorie [hep-th]

Iosif Bena, Graña Mariana, Stanislav Kuperstein, Stefano Massai. Tachyonic anti-M2 branes. Journal of High Energy Physics, 2014, 1406, pp.173. ⟨10.1007/JHEP06(2014)173⟩. ⟨cea-00973220⟩