Heterotic string corrections from the dual type-II string

We introduce a method of using the a dual type-IIA string to compute α′-corrections to the moduli space of heterotic string compactifications. In particular we study the hypermultiplet moduli space of a heterotic string on a K3 surface. One application of this machinery shows that type-IIB strings compactified on a Calabi-Yau space suffer from worldsheet instantons, spacetime instantons and, in addition, "mixed" instantons which in a sense are both worldsheet and spacetime. As another application we look at the hyperkähler limit of the moduli space in which the K3 surface becomes an ALE space. This is a variant of the "geometric engineering" method used for vector multiplet moduli space and should be applicable to a wide range of examples. In particular we reproduce Sen and Witten's result for the heterotic string on an A1 singularity and a trivial bundle and generalize this to a collection of E8 point-like instantons on an ALE space.

Duke Scholars

Author Paul Stephen Aspinwall Mathematics

Author M. Ronen Plesser Physics