Note on tachyon actions in string theory
- Martin Fisher School of Physics, Brandeis University, Waltham, Massachusetts 02454 (United States)
A number of spacetime fields in string theory (notably the metric, dilaton, bosonic and type 0 bulk closed-string tachyon, and bosonic open-string tachyon) have the following property: whenever the spacetime field configuration factorizes in an appropriate sense, the matter sector of the world-sheet theory factorizes into a tensor product of two decoupled theories. Since the beta functions for such a product theory necessarily also factorize, this property strongly constrains the form of the spacetime action encoding those beta functions. We show that this constraint alone--without needing actually to compute any of the beta functions--is sufficient to fix the form of the two-derivative action for the metric-dilaton system, as well as the potential for the bosonic open-string tachyon. We also show that no action consistent with this constraint exists for the closed-string tachyon coupled to the metric and dilaton.
- OSTI ID:
- 21260043
- Journal Information:
- Physical Review. D, Particles Fields, Vol. 79, Issue 4; Other Information: DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevD.79.046009; (c) 2009 The American Physical Society; Country of input: International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA); ISSN 0556-2821
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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