Abstract

In braneworld models coming from string theory one generally encounters massless scalar degrees of freedom -moduli- parameterizing the volume of small compact extra-dimensions. Here we discuss the effects of such moduli on Newtont's law for a fairly general 5-D supersymmetric braneworld scenario with a bulk scalar field phi. We show that the Newtonian potential describing the gravitational interaction between two bodies localized on the visible brane picks up a non-trivial contribution at short distances that depends on the shape of the superpotential W(phi) of the theory. In particular, we compute this contribution for dilatonic braneworld scenarios W(phi) proportional to e(alpha phi) (where a is a constant) and discuss the particular case of 5-D Heterotic M-theory.