Homotopy Operators and One-Loop Vacuum Energy at the Tachyon Vacuum
We construct homotopy operators for the BRST operator in the theory around identitybased solutions, which are believed to represent the tachyon vacuum in the cubic bosonic open string field theory. Using the homotopy operators, we find that the one-loop vacuum energy at the tachyon vacuum is independent of moduli such as interbrane distances, which are included in the BRST operator. We also revisit the cohomology problem, which was solved earlier without the homotopy operators.

title: On the Generalized Gluing and Resmoothing Theorem
abstract: The generalized gluing and resmoothing theorem originally proved by LeClair, Peskin and Preitschopf, gives a powerful formula for the fused vertex obtained by contracting any two vertices in string field theories. Although the theorem is naturally expected to hold for the vertices at any loop level, the original proof was restricted to the vertices at tree level. Here we present a simplified proof for the tree level theorem and then prove explicitly the extended version at one-loop level. We also find that a non-trivial sign factor, which depends on the string states to be contracted, appears in the theorem. This sign factor turns out to be essential for reproducing correctly the conformal field theory correlation function on the torus.

title: Marginal deformations and closed string couplings in open string field theory
abstract: We investigate analytic classical solutions in open string field theory which are constructed in terms of marginal operators. In the classical background, we evaluate a coupling between an on-shell closed string state and the open string field. The resulting coupling exhibits periodic behavior as expected from the marginal boundary deformation of background Wilson lines or a marginal tachyon lump. We confirm that the solutions in open string field theory correspond to a class of marginal deformations in conformal field theory.

title: Tachyon condensation and universal solutions in string field theory
abstract: We investigate a non-perturbative vacuum in open string field theory expanded around the analytic classical solution which has been found in the universal Fock space generated by matter Virasoro generators and ghost oscillators. We carry out level-truncation analyses up to level (6,18) in the theory around one-parameter families of the solution. We observe that the value of the vacuum energy cancels the D-brane tension as the approximation level is increased, but this non-perturbative vacuum disappears at the boundary of the parameter space. These results provide strong evidence for the conjecture that, although the universal solutions are pure gauge in almost all the parameter space, they are regarded as the tachyon vacuum solution at the boundary.

title: Level truncation analysis of exact solutions in open string field theory
abstract: We evaluate vacuum energy density of Schnabl's solution using the level truncation calculation and the total action including interaction terms. The level truncated solution provides vacuum energy density expected both for tachyon vacuum and trivial pure gauge. We discuss the role of the phantom term to reproduce correct vacuum energy.

title: Closed string amplitudes in open string field theory
abstract: We investigate gauge invariant operators corresponding to on-shell closed string states in open string field theory. Using both oscillator representation and conformal mapping techniques, we calculate a two closed string tachyon amplitude that connects two gauge invariant operators by an open string propagator. We find that this amplitude is in a complete agreement with the usual disc amplitude.

title: Dark energy from inflation
abstract: We show that a very light scalar field experiencing quantum fluctuations during primordial inflation can explain the current cosmic acceleration. Provided its mass does not exceed the Hubble parameter today, this field has been frozen during the cosmological ages to start dominating the universe only recently. Assuming this scenario to be correct, and using supernovae data, the model predicts the energy scale of primordial inflation to be around a few TeV and suggests that it has lasted for an extremely long period. Dark energy could therefore be a natural consequence of cosmic inflation close to the electroweak energy scale.

title: Constraints on natural inflation from cosmic microwave background
abstract: We study constraints on the natural inflation model from the cosmic microwave background radiation (CMBR). Inflaton φ for the natural inflation has a potential of the form V=Λ 4 [1− cos (φ/ 2 f φ )] , which is parametrized by two parameters f φ and Λ . Various cosmological quantities, like the primordial curvature perturbation and the CMBR anisotropy, are determined as functions of these two parameters. Using recent observations of the CMBR anisotropy by BOOMERANG and MAXIMA (as well as those from COBE), constraints on the parameters f φ and Λ are derived. The model with f φ lower than 8.5×10 18 (5.4×10 18 , 4.5×10 18 ) GeV predicts a power spectrum with index n S smaller than 0.95 (0.9, 0.85) which suppresses the CMBR anisotropy for smaller angular scale. With such a small n S , height of the second acoustic peak can become significantly lower than the case of the scale-invariant Harrison–Zeldovich spectrum.

title: The ASTRO-H X-ray Observatory
abstract: The joint JAXA/NASA ASTRO-H mission is the sixth in a series of highly successful X-ray missions initiated by the Institute of Space and Astronautical Science (ISAS). ASTRO-H will investigate the physics of the highenergy universe via a suite of four instruments, covering a very wide energy range, from 0.3 keV to 600 keV. These instruments include a high-resolution, high-throughput spectrometer sensitive over 0.3–12 keV with high spectral resolution of ΔE ≦ 7 eV, enabled by a micro-calorimeter array located in the focal plane of thin-foil X-ray optics; hard X-ray imaging spectrometers covering 5–80 keV, located in the focal plane of multilayer-coated, focusing hard X-ray mirrors; a wide-field imaging spectrometer sensitive over 0.4–12 keV, with an X-ray CCD camera in the focal plane of a soft X-ray telescope; and a non-focusing Compton-camera type soft gamma-ray detector, sensitive in the 40–600 keV band. The simultaneous broad bandpass, coupled with high spectral resolution, will enable the pursuit of a wide variety of important science themes.

title: Cosmic degeneracy with dark energy equation of state
abstract: We discuss a degeneracy between the geometry of the universe and the dark energy equation of state wX which exists in the power spectrum of the cosmic microwave background. In particular, for the case with wX<−1, this degeneracy has interesting implications to a lower bound on wX from observations. It is also discussed how this degeneracy can be removed using current observations of type Ia supernovae.

title: Cosmic Microwave Background Anisotropy in models with Quintessence
abstract: We study the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) anisotropies produced by cosine-type quintessence models. In our analysis, effects of the adiabatic and isocurvature fluctuations are both taken into account. For purely adiabatic fluctuations with scale invariant spectrum, we obtain a stringent constraint on the model parameters using the CMB data from COBE, BOOMERanG and MAXIMA. Furthermore, it is shown that isocurvature fluctuations have significant effects on the CMB angular power spectrum at low multipoles in some parameter space, which may be detectable in future satellite experiments. Such a signal may be used to test the cosine-type quintessence models.