Effective field theories of warped extra dimensions

In this dissertation I consider phenomenological and theoretical aspects of the Randall-Sundrum compactifications of Anti-de Sitter space.; In the first part of this work I study a generalization of the Randall-Sundrum (RS) scenario with arbitrary brane tensions and its supersymmetric extension. In the original RS model the brane tensions are tuned with the cosmological constant of the bulk. The distance between the branes, which sets the hierarchy between the Planck and the electro-weak scale, is a modulus of the compactification. In the "detuned" RS model instead, the distance between the branes is fixed at the classical level. From the low energy effective theory point of view a potential is generated which stabilizes the radius of the extra dimension. In the supersymmetric case it is shown that supersymmetry can be broken spontaneously by a non-trivial Wilson line for the graviphoton. This effect vanishes in the tuned limit of the model.; In the second part of this thesis, inspired by the AdS/CFT ideas, I study and develop a renormalization group approach for the RS model. In this formalism the branes are movable in the five-dimensional bulk. By changing the location of the branes a flow for the brane-localized couplings is generated (even at the classical level). This "brane running" method can be used in two ways. I first describe how this formalism allows to compute correlations function in the full AdS/CFT correspondence and apply this technique to holographic computations in the Randall-Sundrum scenario with one or two branes. After extending the brane running approach to gauge theories and gravity, I then employ this method to compute effective theories in the RS scenario.