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I've seen in these lectures by Freddy Cachazo that type II-A/B superstring theory has to contain D-branes and open strings non-perturbatively, even though it appears to only contain closed strings in the perturbation theory. I've also read here that heterotic superstring theory might also contain p-branes.

Is it known whether closed bosonic string theory contains branes, i.e. objects different from the fundamental string, even if they don't appear perturbatively, as in the type II A/B superstring case?

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I would say that the bosonic string doesn't make sense non-perturbatively so the question of whether it contains non-perturbative objects is meaningless to begin with.

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  • $\begingroup$ (That being said, half of the heterotic string is the bosonic string. And heterotic does not contain D-branes so...) $\endgroup$
    – AccidentalFourierTransform
    Oct 23, 2022 at 22:06
  • $\begingroup$ But it does contain NS5-branes... $\endgroup$
    – Mitchell Porter
    Oct 24, 2022 at 2:33
  • $\begingroup$ Doesn't make sense non-perturbatively? Is this to do with the existence of the tachyon, or something else? $\endgroup$
    – tomdodd4598
    Oct 24, 2022 at 16:13
  • $\begingroup$ Yes to Mitchell and Yes to OP. $\endgroup$
    – AccidentalFourierTransform
    Oct 24, 2022 at 22:49

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