Time dependent string compactification: towards bouncing cosmology

A

bstract

We study the Null Energy Condition (NEC) arising from the Virasoro constraint on the string worldsheet. We then analyze how the NEC in the external spacetime directions emerges under general time-dependent string compactifications. Finally, we exhibit compactifications in which the averaged Einstein-frame condition allows the lower-dimensional description of the external spacetime to violate the NEC, thereby realizing a bouncing cosmology, while the higher-dimensional NEC remains satisfied, as dictated by worldsheet symmetry. We comment on scale-separated solutions obtained through the averaged Einstein-frame condition.