Dynamical formation of horizons in recoiling D-branes

A toy calculation of string or D-particle interactions within a world-sheet approach indicates that quantum recoil effects-reflecting the gravitational back reaction on space-time foam due to the propagation of energetic particles-induces the appearance of a microscopic event horizon, or "bubble, " inside which stable matter can exist. The scattering event causes this horizon to expand, but we expect quantum effects to cause it to contract again, in a "bounce" solution. Within such "bubbles, " massless matter propagates with an effective velocity that is less than the velocity of light in vacuo, which may lead to observable violations of Lorentz symmetry that may be tested experimentally. The conformal invariance conditions in the interior geometry of the bubbles select preferentially 3 for the number of the spatial dimensions, corresponding to a consistent formulation of the interaction of D3-branes with recoiling D particles, which are allowed to fluctuate independently only on the D3-brane hypersurface. (27 refs).