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  • Letter
  • Open Access

String tension between de Sitter vacua and curvature corrections

Ivano Basile1,* and Alessia Platania2,†

  • 1Service de Physique de l’Univers, Champs et Gravitation, Université de Mons, Place du Parc 20, 7000 Mons, Belgium
  • 2Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics, 31 Caroline Street North, Waterloo, Ontario N2L 2Y5, Canada

  • *ivano.basile@umons.ac.be
  • †aplatania@perimeterinstitute.ca
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Phys. Rev. D 104, L121901 – Published 6 December, 2021

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevD.104.L121901

Abstract

Higher-derivative corrections to cosmological effective actions in string theory are largely constrained by T-duality, but have been computed hitherto only to the first few orders in the string scale α′. The functional renormalization group, in conjunction with the strong constraints imposed by T-duality, allows us to derive cosmological effective actions to all orders in α′ while avoiding “truncations” of the theory space. We show that the resulting higher-derivative α′-corrections forbid the existence of de Sitter vacua, at least in regimes where string-loop corrections can be neglected. Our findings thus support the no-de Sitter swampland conjecture in the presence of all-order effects in α′.

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Phys. Rev. D 104, L121901– Published 6 December, 2021
  • Received 24 March 2021
  • Accepted 19 November 2021
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