Asymmetric Orbifolds, Noncommutative Geometry and Type I String Vacua

Abstract

We investigate the D-brane contents of asymmetric orbifolds. Using T-duality we find that the consistent description of open strings in asymmetric orbifolds requires to turn on background gauge fields on the D-branes. We derive the corresponding noncommutative geometry arising on such D-branes with mixed Neumann-Dirichlet boundary conditions directly by applying an asymmetric rotation to open strings with pure Dirichlet or Neumann boundary conditions. As a concrete application of our results we construct asymmetric type I vacua requiring open strings with mixed boundary conditions for tadpole cancellation.