Unquenched flavor on the Higgs branch

Understand

We construct the gravity duals of the Higgs branches of three-dimensional (four-dimensional) super Yang-Mills theories coupled to $N_\textrm{f}$ quark flavors.

• The effect of the quarks on the color degrees of freedom is included, and corresponds on the gravity side to the backreaction of $N_\textrm{f}$ flavor D6-branes (D7-branes) on the background of $N_\textrm{c}$ color D2-branes (D3-branes).
• The Higgsing of the gauge group arises from the dissolution of some color branes inside the flavor branes.
• The dissolved color branes are represented by non-Abelian instantons whose backreaction is also included.