Closing the Generation Gap

Abstract

I describe recent examples of phase transitions in four-dimensional M theory vacua in which the net generation number changes. There are naive obstructions to transitions lifting chiral matter, but loopholes exist which enable us to avoid them. I first review how chirality arises in the heterotic limit of M theory, previously known forms of topology change in string theory, and chirality-changing phase transitions in six dimensions. This leads to the construction of the four-dimensional examples, which involve wrapped M-theory fivebranes at an $E_8$ wall.

8 pages, harvmac big, preprint number corrected (Talk presented at STRINGS'97, Amsterdam)

References in corpus (5)

• Vector Bundles And F Theory
• Aspects of N=2 Supersymmetric Gauge Theories in Three Dimensions
• On Four-Dimensional Compactifications of F-Theory
• Chirality Changing Phase Transitions in 4d String Vacua
• Non-Perturbative Heterotic D=6,4 Orbifold Vacua

Cited by in corpus (1)

• Chirality Change in String Theory