In the context of type IIB string theory we combine moduli stabilisation and model building on branes at del Pezzo singularities in a fully consistent global compactifi-cation. By means of toric geometry, we classify all the Calabi-Yau manifolds with 3 < h 1,1 < 6 which admit two identical del Pezzo singularities mapped into each other under the orientifold involution. This effective singularity hosts the visible sector containing the Standard Model while the Kähler moduli are stabilised via a combination of D-terms, perturbative and non-perturbative effects supported on hidden sectors. We present concrete models where the visible sector, containing the Standard Model, gauge and matter content, is built via fractional D3-branes at del Pezzo singularities and all the Kähler moduli are fixed providing an explicit realisation of both KKLT and LARGE volume scenarios, the latter with D-term uplifting to de Sitter minima. We perform the consistency checks for global embedding such as tadpole, K-theory charges and Freed-Witten anomaly cancellation. We briefly discuss phenomenological and cosmological implications of our models.

We study half-twisted linear sigma models relevant to (0,2) compactifications of the heterotic string. Focusing on theories with a (2,2) locus, we examine the linear model parameter space and the dependence of genus zero half-twisted correlators on these parameters. We show that in a class of theories the correlators and parameters separate into A and B types, present techniques to compute the dependence, and apply these to some examples. These results should bear on the mathematics of (0,2) mirror symmetry and the physics of the moduli space and Yukawa couplings in heterotic compactifications.

We study the range of orientational order of a single layer of cylindrical block copolymer microdomains annealed on several types of substrates. The orientational persistence length or nematic correlation length (ξ) is evaluated using recently developed imaging and analysis methods to measure the grain size of the block copolymer microdomains. We show that the substrate can lower ξ for block copolymers with a majority component that interacts strongly with the substrate, but this can be mitigated by attaching a buffer layer of polystyrene brushes to the substrate. In addition, we show that, for a block copolymer where the block that strongly interacts with the substrate is the minority component, the microdomain correlation length does not increase when substrates are treated with this buffer layer. We suggest that in this case the brushes do not increase ξ not only because of the lower volume fraction of the strongly interacting component but also because there are block copolymer wetting layers at the free and substrate interfaces that decouple the microdomains from the substrate in a similar manner as the polystyrene brushes.

Compactifications of the physical superstring to two dimensions provide a general template for realizing 2D conformal field theories coupled to worldsheet gravity, i.e. non-critical string theories. Motivated by this observation, in this paper we determine the quasi-topological 8D theory which governs the vacua of 2D N = (0, 2) gauged linear sigma models (GLSMs) obtained from compactifications of type I and heterotic strings on a Calabi-Yau fourfold. We also determine the quasi-topological 6D theory governing the 2D vacua of intersecting 7-branes in compactifications of F-theory on an elliptically fibered Calabi-Yau fivefold, where matter fields and interaction terms localize on lowerdimensional subspaces, i.e. defect operators. To cancel anomalies / cancel tadpoles, these GLSMs must couple to additional chiral sectors, which in some cases do not admit a known description in terms of a UV GLSM. Additionally, we find that constructing an anomaly free spectrum can sometimes break supersymmetry due to spacetime filling anti-branes. We also study various canonical examples such as the standard embedding of heterotic strings on a Calabi-Yau fourfold and F-theoretic "rigid clusters" with no local deformation moduli of the elliptic fibration.

Spatially extended dynamical systems exhibit complex behaviour in both space and time--spatiotemporal chaos. Analysis of dynamical quantities (such as fractal dimensions and Lyapunov exponents) has provided insights into low-dimensional systems; but it has proven more difficult to understand spatiotemporal chaos in high-dimensional systems, despite abundant data describing its statistical properties. Initial attempts have been made to extend the dynamical approach to higher-dimensional systems, demonstrating numerically that the spatiotemporal chaos in several simple models is extensive (the number of dynamical degrees of freedom scales with the system volume). Here we report a computational investigation of a phenomenon found in nature, 'spiral defect' chaos in Rayleigh-Benard convection, in which we find that the spatiotemporal chaos in this state is extensive and characterized by about a hundred dynamical degrees of freedom. By studying the detailed space-time evolution of the dynamical degrees of freedom, we find that the mechanism for the generation of chaotic disorder is spatially and temporally localized to events associated with the creation and annihilation of defects.