Chameleonic dilaton, nonequivalent frames, and the cosmological constant
  problem in quantum string theory
  The chameleonic behaviour of the String theory dilaton is suggested. Some of
the possible consequences of the chameleonic string dilaton are analyzed in
detail. In particular, (1) we suggest a new stringy solution to the
cosmological constant problem and (2) we point out the non-equivalence of
different conformal frames at the quantum level. In order to obtain these
results, we start taking into account the (strong coupling) string loop
expansion in the string frame (S-frame), therefore the so-called form factors
are present in the effective action. The correct Dark Energy scale is recovered
in the Einstein frame (E-frame) without unnatural fine-tunings and this result
is robust against all quantum corrections, granted that we assume a proper
structure of the S-frame form factors in the strong coupling regime. At this
stage, the possibility still exists that a certain amount of fine-tuning may be
required to satisfy some phenomenological constraints. Moreover in the E-frame,
in our proposal, all the interactions are switched off on cosmological length
scales (i.e. the theory is IR-free), while higher derivative gravitational
terms might be present locally (on short distances) and it remains to be seen
whether these facts clash with phenomenology. A detailed phenomenological
analysis is definitely necessary to clarify these points.
