A Worldsheet Theory for Supergravity

TL;DR

This paper introduces a worldsheet theory that encodes supergravity equations of motion as quantum corrections, providing a novel approach to connect string worldsheet models with target space supergravity.

Contribution

It develops a worldsheet framework for supergravity in curved space, deriving supergravity equations directly from quantum consistency conditions.

Findings

Supergravity equations emerge as quantum corrections.

The theory precisely describes maps into curved target spaces with B-field and dilaton.

Path integral constraints generalize scattering equations to curved backgrounds.

Abstract

We present a worldsheet theory that describes maps into a curved target space equipped with a B-field and dilaton. The conditions for the theory to be consistent at the quantum level can be computed exactly, and are that the target space fields obey the nonlinear d=10 supergravity equations of motion, with no higher curvature terms. The path integral is constrained to obey a generalization of the scattering equations to curved space. Remarkably, the supergravity field equations emerge as quantum corrections to these curved space scattering equations.