AdS/CFT duality & string theory orbifolds

We will study non-trivial examples of AdS/CFT duality where the string theory target space is a deformation (orbifold or orientifold) of the standard AdS5xS5. These backgrounds have gained interest recently due to advancements in supersymmetric localisation and integrability, which allow for exact computations of observables at strong coupling in the dual description.

In particular, we will look at the Z2-orbifold of type IIB string theory on AdS5xS5 which preserves N=2 supersymmetry. The orbifolding procedure leaves an AdS5xS1 subspace fixed under its action and introduces a single twisted sector. The light modes localised at the twisted sector may be described in terms of a 6d effective action.

We seek to interpret these modes by considering orbifold resolutions of S5/Z2, where, remarkably, these resolutions are also solutions of IIB supergravity. The dual theory is a two-node quiver gauge theory where localisation techniques allow to compute twisted sector correlation functions at strong coupling. We aim to match these strong-coupling corrections to a'- corrections at the level of the corresponding supergravity action.

A possible direction can then then to generalise the above program to study Zk orbifolds at large k, or look at some M-theory orbifolds.