Seminar series
Date
Mon, 21 Apr 2008
Time
12:00 -
13:00
Location
L3
Speaker
Mohab Abou Zeid
Organisation
Institute for Mathematical Sciences
I will present a modification of twistor string theory which gives the spectrum of super Yang-Mills theory coupled to Einstein supergravity instead of the higher derivative conformal supergravity arising in the original twistor strings of Witten and of Berkovits. After reviewing the world-sheet formulation of the Berkovits model, I will describe the symmetries of the so-called beta-gamma systems and their gauging. I will then explain how the analysis can be applied to the construction of a family of new gauged Berkovits twistor strings which are free from world-sheet anomalies. The new theories include one with the spectrum of N=8 supergravity, two theories with the spectrum of N=4 supergravity coupled to N=4 Yang-Mills, a family of N>0 models with the spectra of self-dual supergravity coupled to self-dual super-Yang-Mills, and a non-supersymmetric string with the spectrum of self-dual gravity coupled to self-dual Yang-Mills and a scalar. Time permitting, I will discuss what is known about the interactions in the new theories.