Towards classical de Sitter solutions in string theory

We investigate the type II string effective potential at tree-level for de Sitter critical points. We derive necessary ingredients for having de Sitter solutions in orientifold models with fluxes. Furthermore, we examine some explicit O6 compactifications in IIA theory on manifolds with SU(3)-structure in the limit where the orientifold sources are smeared. In particular, we use a simple ten-dimensional Ansatz for four-dimensional de Sitter solutions and find the explicit criteria in terms of the torsion classes such that these de Sitter solutions solve the equations of motion. We have verified these torsion conditions for the cosets and the Iwasawa manifold and it turns out that the conditions cannot be fulfilled for these spaces. However this investigation allows us to find new non-supersymmetric AdS solutions for some cosets. It remains an open question whether there exist SU(3)-structure manifolds that satisfy the conditions on the torsion classes for the simple de Sitter solutions to exist.