Timo Weigand

One of the challenges of supersymmetry (SUSY) breaking and mediation is generating a mu term consistent with the requirements of electro-weak symmetry breaking. The most common approach to the problem is to generate the mu term through a SUSY breaking F-term. Often these models produce unacceptably large B mu terms as a result. We will present an alternate approach, where the mu term is generated directly by non-perturtative effects. The same non-perturbative effect will also retrofit the model of SUSY breaking in such a way that mu is at the same scale as masses of the Standard Model superpartners. Because the mu term is not directly generated by SUSY breaking effects, there is no associated B mu problem. These results are demonstrated in a toy model where a stringy instanton generates mu.

We systematically analyse globally consistent SU(5) GUT models on intersecting D7-branes in genuine Calabi-Yau orientifolds with O3- and O7-planes. Beyond the well-known tadpole and K-theory cancellation conditions there exist a number of additional subtle but quite restrictive constraints. For the realisation of SU(5) GUTs with gauge symmetry breaking via U(1)_Y flux we present two classes of suitable Calabi-Yau manifolds defined via del Pezzo transitions of the elliptically fibred hypersurface P_{1,1,1,6,9}[18] and of the Quintic P_{1,1,1,1,1}[5], respectively. To define an orientifold projection we classify all involutions on del Pezzo surfaces. We work out the model building prospects of these geometries and present five globally consistent string GUT models in detail, including a 3-generation SU(5) model with no exotics whatsoever. We also realise other phenomenological features such as the 10 10 5 Yukawa coupling and comment on the possibility of moduli stabilisation, where we find an entire new set of so-called swiss-cheese type Calabi-Yau manifolds. It is expected that both the general constrained structure and the concrete models lift to F-theory vacua on compact Calabi-Yau fourfolds.