Aspects of (2, 0) string compactifications

Abstract

This paper is devoted to the study of compactifications of the heterotic string with (2, 0) world sheet supersymmetry. This leads to a theory with N = 1 supersymmetry in spacetime. It has been claimed on general grounds that (2, 0) compactifications should not be solutions to the string equations of motion when the effect of world sheet instantons is taken into account. We find that this is not necessarily correct. We formulate a precise condition for a (2, 0) compactification to be a solution and construct the first explicit example of a nontrivial (2, 0) compactification on a Calabi-Yau manifold. We discuss general techniques for analysing the structure of the four-dimensional effective theories that result from (2, 0) compactifications. © 1988.