# nLab black brane

### Context

#### Gravity

gravity, supergravity

# Contents

## Idea

The theory of gravity in $3+1$ dimensions famously has black hole solutions, being the limiting configuration of a point mass gravitational source. In higher dimensional gravity, and in particular in higher dimensional supergravity, there are analogous solutions, which however are limiting configurations of a gravitational source that is supported on a line, or a surface, or a higher dimensional space. For a surface one might speak of black membrane solutions hence generally of black brane solutions.

## Properties

### Weak coupling correspondence

The types of black branes that can occur in theories of supergravity that are obtained from the maximal 11-dimensional supergravity match precisely the types of D-branes and NS-branes that appear in the corresponding perturbative superstring theories.

The idea is that both these brane-phenomena are aspects of one single entity:

• At low string coupling the D-brane/NS-brane description is accurate. Low string coupling implies that the coupling of gravity is weak, hence that the back-reaction of the branes on the background geometry is negligible.

• At large string coupling but low energy, the effective supergravity description becomes accurate. Here the branes do back-react on the gravitational background and hence create the black brane spacetime geometry.

This duality of the brane picture is at the heart of the AdS/CFT correspondence. See there for more details.

## Examples

Table of branes appearing in supergravity/string theory (for classification see at brane scan).

branein supergravitycharged under gauge fieldhas worldvolume theory
black branesupergravityhigher gauge fieldSCFT
D-branetype IIRR-fieldsuper Yang-Mills theory
$\left(D=2n\right)$type IIA$\phantom{\rule{thinmathspace}{0ex}}$$\phantom{\rule{thinmathspace}{0ex}}$
D0-brane$\phantom{\rule{thinmathspace}{0ex}}$$\phantom{\rule{thinmathspace}{0ex}}$BFSS matrix model
D2-brane$\phantom{\rule{thinmathspace}{0ex}}$$\phantom{\rule{thinmathspace}{0ex}}$$\phantom{\rule{thinmathspace}{0ex}}$
D4-brane$\phantom{\rule{thinmathspace}{0ex}}$$\phantom{\rule{thinmathspace}{0ex}}$D=5 super Yang-Mills theory with Khovanov homology observables
D6-brane$\phantom{\rule{thinmathspace}{0ex}}$$\phantom{\rule{thinmathspace}{0ex}}$
D8-brane$\phantom{\rule{thinmathspace}{0ex}}$$\phantom{\rule{thinmathspace}{0ex}}$
$\left(D=2n+1\right)$type IIB$\phantom{\rule{thinmathspace}{0ex}}$$\phantom{\rule{thinmathspace}{0ex}}$
D1-brane$\phantom{\rule{thinmathspace}{0ex}}$$\phantom{\rule{thinmathspace}{0ex}}$2d CFT with BH entropy
D3-brane$\phantom{\rule{thinmathspace}{0ex}}$$\phantom{\rule{thinmathspace}{0ex}}$N=4 D=4 super Yang-Mills theory
D5-brane$\phantom{\rule{thinmathspace}{0ex}}$$\phantom{\rule{thinmathspace}{0ex}}$$\phantom{\rule{thinmathspace}{0ex}}$
D7-brane$\phantom{\rule{thinmathspace}{0ex}}$$\phantom{\rule{thinmathspace}{0ex}}$$\phantom{\rule{thinmathspace}{0ex}}$
D9-brane$\phantom{\rule{thinmathspace}{0ex}}$$\phantom{\rule{thinmathspace}{0ex}}$$\phantom{\rule{thinmathspace}{0ex}}$
NS-branetype I, II, heteroticcircle n-connection$\phantom{\rule{thinmathspace}{0ex}}$
string$\phantom{\rule{thinmathspace}{0ex}}$B2-field2d SCFT
NS5-brane$\phantom{\rule{thinmathspace}{0ex}}$B6-fieldlittle string theory
M-brane11D SuGra/M-theorycircle n-connection$\phantom{\rule{thinmathspace}{0ex}}$
M2-brane$\phantom{\rule{thinmathspace}{0ex}}$C3-fieldABJM theory, BLG model
M5-brane$\phantom{\rule{thinmathspace}{0ex}}$C6-field6d (2,0)-superconformal QFT
topological M2-branetopological M-theoryC3-field on G2-manifold
topological M5-brane$\phantom{\rule{thinmathspace}{0ex}}$C6-field on G2-manifold

## References

Reviews include

section 1.3 of

Recent developments include

• Jay Armas, Joan Camps, Troels Harmark, Niels A. Obers, The Young Modulus of Black Strings and the Fine Structure of Blackfolds (arXiv:1110.4835)

Revised on November 27, 2012 21:11:36 by Urs Schreiber (131.174.40.214)