Closed-string tachyon condensation and the worldsheet super-higgs effect.
Alternative gauge choices for worldsheet supersymmetry can elucidate dynamical phenomena obscured in the usual superconformal gauge. In the particular example of the tachyonic E8 heterotic string, we use a judicious gauge choice to show that the process of closed-string tachyon condensation can be understood in terms of a worldsheet super-Higgs effect. The worldsheet gravitino assimilates the goldstino and becomes a dynamical propagating field. Conformal, but not superconformal, invariance is maintained throughout.
Horava
Petr
P
Berkeley Center for Theoretical Physics and Department of Physics, University of California, Berkeley, California 94720-7300, USA.
Keeler
Cynthia A
CA