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from Part II - Developments
We now begin a study of D-branes that carry electric or magnetic fields on their world-volume. Open strings couple to these electromagnetic fields at their endpoints. Using the tools of T-duality we show that a D-brane with an electric field is physically equivalent to a moving D-brane with no electric field. The constraint that a D-brane cannot move faster than light implies that the strength of an electric field cannot exceed a certain maximum value. We also show that a Dp-brane with a magnetic field is T-duality equivalent to a tilted D(p − 1)-brane with no magnetic field. Alternatively, the magnetic field on the Dp-brane can be thought of as being created by a distribution of dissolved D(p − 2)-branes.
Maxwell fields coupling to open strings
Among the quantum states of open strings attached to a D-brane we found photon states with polarizations and momentum along the D-brane directions. We thus deduced that a Maxwell field lives on the world-volume of a D-brane. The existence of this Maxwell field was in fact necessary to preserve the gauge invariance of the term that couples the Kalb–Ramond field to the string in the presence of a D-brane. We also learned that the endpoints of open strings carry Maxwell charge.
Since any D-brane has a Maxwell field, it is physically reasonable to expect that background electromagnetic fields can exist: there may be electric or magnetic fields that permeate the D-brane.
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