Manifest Duality in Low-Energy Superstrings

TL;DR

This paper introduces a new formalism for low-energy limits of string theories that makes spacetime duality and stringy properties explicit, unifying various fields into a single multiplet with enlarged symmetries.

Contribution

It develops a formalism that makes duality and handedness manifest in low-energy string field theories, unifying multiple fields into a single multiplet with extended symmetries.

Findings

Manifest duality and handedness in low-energy string theories

Unified treatment of graviton, axion, and Yang-Mills fields

Discussion of modifications for nonabelian Yang-Mills

Abstract

String theories inspire a new formalism for their low-energy limits. In this approach to these field theories, spacetime duality and stringy left/right handedness are manifest. Enlarged tangent-space symmetries allow the different fields (graviton, axion, Yang-Mills) to be treated as a single multiplet, even in the bosonic case, except for the dilaton (multiplet), which appears as the measure. (Based on a talk given at Strings '93, May 24-29, Berkeley, CA. A section added after the talk discusses modifications for nonabelian Yang-Mills.)