Minimum Distances in Non-Trivial String Target Spaces

Abstract

The idea of minimum distance, familiar from R <-> 1/R duality when the string target space is a circle, is analyzed for less trivial geometries. The particular geometry studied is that of a blown-up quotient singularity within a Calabi-Yau space and mirror symmetry is used to perform the analysis. It is found that zero distances can appear but that in many cases this requires other distances within the same target space to be infinite. In other cases zero distances can occur without compensating infinite distances.