Abstract

Although scenarios of supersymmetry breaking frequently involve strong dynamics of a hidden sector, the SUSY-breaking effects are often communicated to the visible sector via a weakly coupled messenger sector. In such cases, standard perturbative techniques can be used to calculate visible sector soft terms. However, in (for example) the framework of semi-direct gauge mediation, where the messenger sector is charged under a hidden sector gauge group, the messengers can be strongly coupled to the hidden sector gauge group if the latter exists at large 't Hooft coupling. Although standard perturbative techniques do not apply for large 't Hooft coupling, it is in this regime that the gauge/gravity correspondence can be most reliably applied. In the first part of the talk, intended for non-experts, I will qualitatively review this duality and how it can be applied to gauge mediation. I will then discuss how recently developed supergravity solutions can be exploited to realize this correspondence and calculate certain visible sector soft terms.