LVS de Sitter Vacua are probably in the Swampland

Abstract

We argue that dS vacua in the LARGE-volume scenario of type IIB string theory are vulnerable to various unsuppressed curvature, warping and g s corrections. We work out in general how these corrections affect the moduli vevs, the vacuum energy and the moduli masses in the 4D EFT for the two Kähler moduli, the conifold modulus and a nilpotent superfield describing the anti-brane uplift. Our analysis reveals that the corrections are parametrically larger in the relevant expressions than one might have guessed from their suppression in the off-shell potential. Some corrections appear without any parametric suppression at all, which makes them particularly dangerous for candidate dS vacua. Other types of corrections can in principle be made small for appropriate parameter choices. However, we show in an explicit model that this is never possible for all corrections at the same time when the vacuum energy is positive. Some of the corrections we consider are also relevant for the stability of non-supersymmetric AdS vacua.

Anti-brane uplift instability from goldstino condensation

“…One of the central ingredients in typical string theory de Sitter constructions is the use of anti-D3-branes to uplift an AdS vacuum to a de Sitter critical configuration [1][2][3][4][5][6]. Even though the end result of such uplift is often challenged [7], and the existence of tachyons or loss of criticality is implied [8][9][10][11], there is no conclusive indication that the four-dimensional effective field theory suffers from the alleged instabilities (recent selected possible issues from a 10D perspective are further reported in the articles [12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19]). If one assumes that there is a consistent low energy effective field theory that can incorporate the anti-D3-brane uplift, then one expects to be able to embed it within 4D N = 1 Supergravity with the use of a nilpotent chiral superfield that breaks supersymmetry and provides the uplift [20][21][22][23][24][25].…”

Relative scale separation in orbifolds of $S^2$ and $S^5$

“…These results have been generalized to other nonsupersymmetric AdS 5 backgrounds in [44,45]. More generally, it has been conjectured that all non-supersymmetric AdS vacua supported by fluxes are unstable [46][47][48], and recent evidence from the study of concrete examples does not contradict the conjecture [49][50][51]. Since it is expected that supersymmetry is broken unless Γ Ă SU p3q, in this note we will focus on this case.…”

Holography and the KKLT Scenario

“…Given the difficulties of realizing other scenarios for constructing dS solutions in the context of flux vacua (see e.g. [56] for some issues in the LVS context) it is natural to broaden the search for constructing quasi-dS vacua in string theory. Whether or not we can construct meta-stable dS remains an open question in string theory.…”