KKLT Ex Nihilo

Abstract: Flux compactifications that give three- or four-dimensional Anti de Sitter vacua with a parametrically small negative cosmological constant are claimed to be ubiquitous in String Theory. However, the 1+1 and 2+1 dimensional CFT duals to such vacua should have very large central charges and rather unusual properties. We construct brane configurations that source these would-be AdS flux compactifications, and identify certain UV AdS geometries that these branes source. The central charge of the CFT duals to these UV AdS geometries place lower bounds on the absolute values of the cosmological constants of the AdS vacua. These bounds are incompatible with the scale separation needed to construct realistic cosmological models.