Two exercises in supersymmetry: a low-energy supergravity model and free string field theory

The new features of a supersymmetric standard model in the presence of heavy families are studied. The minimal set of Higgs fields, the desert between the electroweak and the grand unification scale and perturbative values of the dimensionless parameters throughout this region are assumed. Using the numerical as well as the approximate analytic solution of the renormalization group equations, the evolution of all the parameters of the theory are studied in the case of large Yukawa couplings for the fourth family. The desired spontaneous symmetry breaking of the electroweak symmetry takes place only for a rather unnatural choice of the initial values of certain mass parameters at the grand unification scale. If it is gravitino mass smaller than 200 GeV the vacuum expectation values of the Higgs fields emerge necessarily in an interplay of the tree level Higgs potential and its quantum corrections and are approximately equal. The qurak masses of the fourth family are roughly 135 GeV, while the mass of the fourth charged lepton has an upper bound of 90 GeV. Further characteristic features of this scenario are one light neutral Higgs field of mass 50 GeV and gluino masses below 75 GeV. If the gravitino mass is higher than 200 GeV one obtains a scaled up version of the well-known three family, heavy top scenario with quark masses between 40 and 205 GeV and all superparticle masses heavier than 150 GeV except the photino, gluino, one chargino and one neutralino. The gauge-invariant theory of the free bosonic open string is generalized to treat closed strings and superstrings. All of these theories can be written as theories of string differential forms defined on suitable spaces. All of the bosonic theories have exactly the same structure; the Ramond theory takes an analogous first-order form. We show explicitly, how to gauge-fix each action to the light-cone gauge and to the Feynman-Siegel gauge

On Gauge Equivalence of Tachyon Solutions in Cubic Neveu-Schwarz String Field Theory

Simple analytic solution to cubic Neveu-Schwarz String Field Theory including the $GSO(-)$ sector is presented. This solution is an analog of the Erler-Schnabl solution for bosonic case and one of the authors solution for the pure $GSO(+)$ case. Gauge transformations of the new solution to others known solutions for the $NS$ string tachyon condensation are constructed explicitly. This gauge equivalence manifestly supports the early observed fact that these solutions have the same value of the action density.Comment: 8 pages, LaTe

Gauge theories of spacetime symmetries

Gauge theories of conformal spacetime symmetries are presented which merge features of Yang-Mills theory and general relativity in a new way. The models are local but nonpolynomial in the gauge fields, with a nonpolynomial structure that can be elegantly written in terms of a metric (or vielbein) composed of the gauge fields. General relativity itself emerges from the construction as a gauge theory of spacetime translations. The role of the models within a general classification of consistent interactions of gauge fields is discussed as well.Comment: 8 pages, revtex; v2: minor improvements of text and formulas; v3: typo in formula after eq. (35) correcte

Superfield Description of a Self-Dual Supergravity a la MacDowell-Mansouri

Using MacDowell-Mansouri theory, in this work, we investigate a superfield description of the self-dual supergravity a la Ashtekar. We find that in order to reproduce previous results on supersymmetric Ashtekar formalism, it is necessary to properly combine the supersymmetric field-strength in the Lagrangian. We extend our procedure to the case of supersymmetric Ashtekar formalism in eight dimensions.Comment: 19 pages, Latex; section 6 improve

Two-Time Physics with gravitational and gauge field backgrounds

It is shown that all possible gravitational, gauge and other interactions experienced by particles in ordinary d-dimensions (one-time) can be described in the language of two-time physics in a spacetime with d+2 dimensions. This is obtained by generalizing the worldline formulation of two-time physics by including background fields. A given two-time model, with a fixed set of background fields, can be gauged fixed from d+2 dimensions to (d-1) +1 dimensions to produce diverse one-time dynamical models, all of which are dually related to each other under the underlying gauge symmetry of the unified two-time theory. To satisfy the gauge symmetry of the two-time theory the background fields must obey certain coupled differential equations that are generally covariant and gauge invariant in the target d+2 dimensional spacetime. The gravitational background obeys a null homothety condition while the gauge field obeys a differential equation that generalizes a similar equation derived by Dirac in 1936. Explicit solutions to these coupled equations show that the usual gravitational, gauge, and other interactions in d dimensions may be viewed as embedded in the higher d+2 dimensional space, thus displaying higher spacetime symmetries that otherwise remain hidden.Comment: Latex, 19 pages, references adde

Noncommutative Sp(2,R) Gauge Theories - A Field Theory Approach to Two-Time Physics

Phase-space and its relativistic extension is a natural space for realizing Sp(2,R) symmetry through canonical transformations. On a Dx2 dimensional covariant phase-space, we formulate noncommutative field theories, where Sp(2,R) plays a role as either a global or a gauge symmetry group. In both cases these field theories have potential applications, including certain aspects of string theories, M-theory, as well as quantum field theories. If interpreted as living in lower dimensions, these theories realize Poincare' symmetry linearly in a way consistent with causality and unitarity. In case Sp(2,R) is a gauge symmetry, we show that the spacetime signature is determined dynamically as (D-2,2). The resulting noncommutative Sp(2,R) gauge theory is proposed as a field theoretical formulation of two-time physics: classical field dynamics contains all known results of `two-time physics', including the reduction of physical spacetime from D to (D-2) dimensions, with the associated `holography' and `duality' properties. In particular, we show that the solution space of classical noncommutative field equations put all massless scalar, gauge, gravitational, and higher-spin fields in (D-2) dimensions on equal-footing, reminiscent of string excitations at zero and infinite tension limits.Comment: 32 pages, LaTe