Origin of the geometric tachyon

Abstract

The motion of a Dp-brane in the background of a stack of coincident NS5-branes is analysed as the motion of a relativistic point particle in the transverse space of the five-branes. In this system, the particle experiences a proper acceleration orthogonal to its proper velocity due to the background dilaton field which changes the dynamics from that of a simple geodesic motion. In particular, we show that in the vicinity of the five-branes, it is this acceleration which is responsible for modifying the motion of the radial mode to that of an inverted simple harmonic oscillator leading to the tachyonic instability.

4 pages, revtex, v2: eq.(22), (24) and (25) corrected