1.

The Relativistic String

All lecture courses on string theory start with a discussion of the point particle. Ours
is no exception. Well take a flying tour through the physics of the relativistic point
particle and extract a couple of important lessons that well take with us as we move
onto string theory.

1.1 The Relativistic Point Particle

We want to write down the Lagrangian describing a relativistic particle of mass m.
In anticipation of string theory, well consider D-dimensional Minkowski space R1,D1 .
Throughout these notes, we work with signature

= diag(1, +1, +1, . . . , +1)

Note that this is the opposite signature to my quantum field theory notes.

If we fix a frame with coordinates X = (t, ~x) the action is simple:

Z q
S = m dt 1 ~x ~x . (1.1)

To see that this is correct we can compute the momentum ~p, conjugate to ~x, and the
energy E which is equal to the Hamiltonian,

m~x p
~p = p , E= m2 + ~p2 ,
1 ~x ~x
both of which should be familiar from courses on special relativity.

Although the Lagrangian (1.1) is correct, its not fully satisfactory. The reason is
that time t and space ~x play very different roles in this Lagrangian. The position ~x is
a dynamical degree of freedom. In contrast, time t is merely a parameter providing a
label for the position. Yet Lorentz transformations are supposed to mix up t and ~x and
such symmetries are not completely obvious in (1.1). Can we find a new Lagrangian
in which time and space are on equal footing?

One possibility is to treat both time and space as labels. This leads us to the
concept of field theory. However, in this course we will be more interested in the other
possibility: we will promote time to a dynamical degree of freedom. At first glance,
this may appear odd: the number of degrees of freedom is one of the crudest ways we
have to characterize a system. We shouldnt be able to add more degrees of freedom

9
at will without fundamentally changing the system that were talking about. Another
way of saying this is that the particle has the option to move in space, but it doesnt
have the option to move in time. It has to move in time. So we somehow need a way
to promote time to a degree of freedom without it really being a true dynamical degree
of freedom! How do we do this? The answer, as we will now show, is gauge symmetry.

Consider the action, X0

Z q
S = m d X X , (1.2)

where = 0, . . . , D 1 and X = dX /d . Weve introduced a

X
new parameter which labels the position along the worldline of
the particle as shown by the dashed lines in the figure. This action
R
has a simple interpretation: it is just the proper time ds along the Figure 3:
worldline.

Naively it looks as if we now have D physical degrees of freedom rather than D 1

because, as promised, the time direction X 0 t is among our dynamical variables:
X 0 = X 0 ( ). However, this is an illusion. To see why, we need to note that the action
(1.2) has a very important property: reparameterization invariance. This means that
we can pick a different parameter on the worldline, related to by any monotonic
function

= ( ) .

Lets check that the action is invariant under transformations of this type. The inte-
gration measure in the action changes as d = d |d /d |. Meanwhile, the velocities
change as dX /d = (dX /d ) (d /d ). Putting this together, we see that the action
can just as well be written in the reparameterization,
r
dX dX
Z
S = m d .
d d
The upshot of this is that not all D degrees of freedom X are physical. For example,
suppose you find a solution to this system, so that you know how X 0 changes with
and how X 1 changes with , and so on. Not all of that information is meaningful
because itself is not meaningful. In particular, we could use our reparameterization
invariance to simply set

= X 0 ( ) t (1.3)

10
If we plug this choice into the action (1.2) then we recover our initial action (1.1). The
reparameterization invariance is a gauge symmetry of the system. Like all gauge sym-
metries, its not really a symmetry at all. Rather, it is a redundancy in our description.
In the present case, it means that although we seem to have D degrees of freedom X ,
one of them is fake.

The fact that one of the degrees of freedom is a fake also shows up if we look at the
momenta,

L mX
p = =q (1.4)
X X X

These momenta arent all independent. They satisfy

p p + m2 = 0 (1.5)

This a constraint on the system. It is, of course, the mass-shell constraint for a rela-
tivistic particle of mass m. From the worldline perspective, it tells us that the particle
isnt allowed to sit still in Minkowski space: at the very least, it had better keep moving
in a timelike direction with (p0 )2 m2 .

One advantage of the action (1.2) is that the Poincare symmetry of the particle is
now manifest, appearing as a global symmetry on the worldline

X X + c (1.6)

where is a Lorentz transformation satisfying = , while c corresponds

to a constant translation. We have made all the symmetries manifest at the price of
introducing a gauge symmetry into our system. A similar gauge symmetry will arise
in the relativistic string, and much of this course will be devoted to understanding its
consequences.

1.1.1 Quantization
Its a trivial matter to quantize this action. We introduce a wavefunction (X). This
satisfies the usual Schrodinger equation,

i = H .

But, computing the Hamiltonian H = X p L, we find that it vanishes: H = 0. This
shouldnt be surprising. It is simply telling us that the wavefunction doesnt depend on

11
 . Since the wavefunction is something physical while, as we have seen, is not, this is
to be expected. Note that this doesnt mean that time has dropped out of the problem.
On the contrary, in this relativistic context, time X 0 is an operator, just like the spatial
coordinates ~x. This means that the wavefunction is immediately a function of space
and time. It is not like a static state in quantum mechanics, but more akin to the fully
integrated solution to the non-relativistic Schrodinger equation.
The classical system has a constraint given by (1.5). In the quantum theory, we
impose this constraint as an operator equation on the wavefunction, namely (p p +
m2 ) = 0. Using the usual representation of the momentum operator p = i/X ,
we recognize this constraint as the Klein-Gordon equation
 
2
+ m (X) = 0 (1.7)
X X
Although this equation is familiar from field theory, its important to realize that the
interpretation is somewhat different. In relativistic field theory, the Klein-Gordon equa-
tion is the equation of motion obeyed by a scalar field. In relativistic quantum mechan-
ics, it is the equation obeyed by the wavefunction. In the early days of field theory,
the fact that these two equations are the same led people to think one should view
the wavefunction as a classical field and quantize it a second time. This isnt cor-
rect, but nonetheless the language has stuck and it is common to talk about the point
particle perspective as first quantization and the field theory perspective as second
quantization.
So far weve considered only a free point particle. How can we
introduce interactions into this framework? We would have to first
decide which interactions are allowed: perhaps the particle can split
into two; perhaps it can fuse with other particles? Obviously, there is
a huge range of options for us to choose from. We would then assign
amplitudes for these processes to happen. There would be certain Figure 4:
restrictions coming from the requirement of unitarity which, among
other things, would lead to the necessity of anti-particles. We could draw diagrams
associated to the different interactions an example is given in the figure and in
this manner we would slowly build up the Feynman diagram expansion that is familiar
from field theory. In fact, this was pretty much the way Feynman himself approached
the topic of QED. However, in practice we rarely construct particle interactions in
this way because the field theory framework provides a much better way of looking at
things. In contrast, this way of building up interactions is exactly what we will later
do for strings.

12
1.1.2 Ein Einbein
There is another action that describes the relativistic point particle. We introduce yet
another field on the worldline, e( ), and write

1
Z  
S= d e1 X 2 em2 , (1.8)
2

where weve used the notation X 2 = X X . For the rest of these lectures, terms
like X 2 will always mean an implicit contraction with the spacetime Minkowski metric.

This form of the action makes it look as if we have coupled the worldline theory to
1d gravity, with the field e( ) acting as an einbein (in the sense of vierbeins that are
introduced in general relativity). To see this, note that we could change notation and
write this action in the more suggestive form
1
Z  
2 2
S= d g g X + m . (1.9)
2

where g = (g )1 is the metric on the worldline and e = g

Although our action appears to have one more degree of freedom, e, it can be easily
checked that it has the same equations of motion as (1.2). The reason for this is that
e is completely fixed by its equation of motion, X 2 + e2 m2 = 0. Substituting this into
the action (1.8) recovers (1.2)

The action (1.8) has a couple of advantages over (1.2). Firstly, it works for massless
particles with m = 0. Secondly, the absence of the annoying square root means that
its easier to quantize in a path integral framework.

The action (1.8) retains invariance under reparameterizations which are now written
in a form that looks more like general relativity. For transformations parameterized by
an infinitesimal , we have
d dX
= ( ) , e = (( )e) , X = ( ) (1.10)
d d
The einbein e transforms as a density on the worldline, while each of the coordinates
X transforms as a worldline scalar.

13
1.2 The Nambu-Goto Action
A particle sweeps out a worldline in Minkowski space. A string
sweeps out a worldsheet. Well parameterize this worldsheet by
one timelike coordinate , and one spacelike coordinate . In this
section well focus on closed strings and take to be periodic,
with range

[0, 2) . (1.11)

We will sometimes package the two worldsheet coordinates to-

gether as = (, ), = 0, 1. Then the string sweeps out a Figure 5:
surface in spacetime which defines a map from the worldsheet to
Minkowski space, X (, ) with = 0, . . . , D 1. For closed strings, we require

X (, ) = X ( + 2, ) .

In this context, spacetime is sometimes referred to as the target space to distinguish it

from the worldsheet.

We need an action that describes the dynamics of this string. The key property
that we will ask for is that nothing depends on the coordinates that we choose
on the worldsheet. In other words, the string action should be reparameterization
invariant. What kind of action does the trick? Well, for the point particle the action
was proportional to the length of the worldline. The obvious generalization is that the
action for the string should be proportional to the area, A, of the worldsheet. This
is certainly a property that is characteristic of the worldsheet itself, rather than any
choice of parameterization.

How do we find the area A in terms of the coordinates X (, )? The worldsheet is

a curved surface embedded in spacetime. The induced metric, , on this surface is
the pull-back of the flat metric on Minkowski space,
X X
= . (1.12)

Then the action which is proportional to the area of the worldsheet is given by,
Z p
S = T d2 det . (1.13)

Here T is a constant of proportionality. We will see shortly that it is the tension of the
string, meaning the mass per unit length.

14
 We can write this action a little more explicitly. The pull-back of the metric is given
by,
!
X 2 X X
= .
X X X 2

where X = X / and X = X /. The action then takes the form,

Z q
2
S = T d (X)2 (X )2 + (X X )2 . (1.14)

This is the Nambu-Goto action for a relativistic string.

Action = Area: A Check

If youre unfamiliar with differential geometry, the argu-
ment about the pull-back of the metric may be a bit slick.
Thankfully, theres a more pedestrian way to see that the
dl 2
action (1.14) is equal to the area swept out by the world-
dl1
sheet. Its slightly simpler to make this argument for a sur-
face embedded in Euclidean space rather than Minkowski
Figure 6:
space. We choose some parameterization of the sheet in
terms of and , as drawn in the figure, and we write the
coordinates of Euclidean space as X(,~ ). Well compute the area of the infinitesimal
shaded region. The vectors tangent to the boundary are,

~ ~
~ 1 = X
dl , ~ 2 = X .
dl

If the angle between these two vectors is , then the area is then given by
q q
~ 1 ||dl
ds2 = |dl ~ 1 dl
~ 2 | sin = dl2 dl2 (1 cos2 ) = dl2 dl2 (dl ~ 2 )2 (1.15)
1 2 1 2

which indeed takes the form of the integrand of (1.14).

Tension and Dimension

Lets now see that T has the physical interpretation of tension. We write Minkowski
coordinates as X = (t, ~x). We work in a gauge with X 0 t = R , where R is a
constant that is needed to balance up dimensions (see below) and will drop out at the
end of the argument. Consider a snapshot of a string configuration at a time when

15
d~x/d = 0 so that the instantaneous kinetic energy vanishes. Evaluating the action for
a time dt gives
Z p Z
S = T d dR (d~x/d)2 = T dt (spatial length of string) . (1.16)

But, when the kinetic energy vanishes, the action is proportional to the time integral
of the potential energy,

potential energy = T (spatial length of string) .

So T is indeed the energy per unit length as claimed. We learn that the string acts
rather like an elastic band and its energy increases linearly with length. (This is different
from the elastic bands youre used to which obey Hookes law where energy increased
quadratically with length). To minimize its potential energy, the string will want to
shrink to zero size. Well see that when we include quantum effects this cant happen
because of the usual zero point energies.

There is a slightly annoying way of writing the tension that has its origin in ancient
history, but is commonly used today

1
T = (1.17)
2

where is pronounced alpha-prime. In the language of our ancestors, is referred

to as the universal Regge slope. Well explain why later in this course.

At this point, its worth pointing out some conventions that we have, until now,
left implicit. The spacetime coordinates have dimension [X] = 1. In contrast, the
worldsheet coordinates are taken to be dimensionless, [] = 0. (This can be seen in our
identification + 2). The tension is equal to the mass per unit length and has
dimension [T ] = 2. Obviously this means that [ ] = 2. We can therefore associate a
length scale, ls , by

= ls2 (1.18)

The string scale ls is the natural length that appears in string theory. In fact, in
a certain sense (that we will make more precise below) this length scale is the only
parameter of the theory.

16
Actual Strings vs. Fundamental Strings
There are several situations in Nature where string-like objects arise. Prime examples
include magnetic flux tubes in superconductors and chromo-electric flux tubes in QCD.
Cosmic strings, a popular speculation in cosmology, are similar objects, stretched across
the sky. In each of these situations, there are typically two length scales associated to
the string: the tension, T and the width of the string, L. For all these objects, the
dynamics is governed by the Nambu-Goto action as long as the curvature of the string is
much greater than L. (In the case of superconductors, one should work with a suitable
non-relativistic version of the Nambu-Goto action).

However, in each of these other cases, the Nambu-Goto action is not the end of the
story. There will typically be additional terms in the action that depend on the width
of the string. The form of these terms is not universal, but often includes a rigidity
piece of form L K 2 , where K is the extrinsic curvature of the worldsheet. Other
R

terms could be added to describe fluctuations in the width of the string.

The string scale, ls , or equivalently the tension, T , depends on the kind of string that
were considering. For example, if were interested in QCD flux tubes then we would
take

T (1 Gev)2 (1.19)

In this course we will consider fundamental strings which have zero width. What this
means in practice is that we take the Nambu-Goto action as the complete description
for all configurations of the string. These strings will have relevance to quantum gravity
and the tension of the string is taken to be much larger, typically an order of magnitude
or so below the Planck scale.

T . Mpl2 = (1018 GeV)2 (1.20)

However, I should point out that when we try to view string theory as a fundamental
theory of quantum gravity, we dont really know what value T should take. As we
will see later in this course, it depends on many other aspects, most notably the string
coupling and the volume of the extra dimensions.

1.2.1 Symmetries of the Nambu-Goto Action

The Nambu-Goto action has two types of symmetry, each of a different nature.

Poincare invariance of the spacetime (1.6). This is a global symmetry from the
perspective of the worldsheet, meaning that the parameters and c which label

17
 the symmetry transformation are constants and do not depend on worldsheet
coordinates .

Reparameterization invariance, (). As for the point particle, this is a

gauge symmetry. It reflects the fact that we have a redundancy in our description
because the worldsheet coordinates have no physical meaning.

1.2.2 Equations of Motion

To derive the equations of motion for the Nambu-Goto string, we first introduce the
momenta which we call because there will be countless other quantities that we want
to call p later,
L (X X )X (X 2 )X
= = T q .
X 2
(X X ) X X 2 2

L (X X )X (X 2 )X
= = T .
X
q
2
(X X ) X X 2 2

The equations of motion are then given by,

+ =0

These look like nasty, non-linear equations. In fact, theres a slightly nicer way to write
these equations, starting from the earlier action (1.13). Recall that the variation of a

determinant is = 21 . Using the definition of the pull-back metric
, this gives rise to the equations of motion
p
( det X ) = 0 , (1.21)
Although this notation makes the equations look a little nicer, were kidding ourselves.
Written in terms of X , they are still the same equations. Still nasty.

1.3 The Polyakov Action

The square-root in the Nambu-Goto action means that its rather difficult to quantize
using path integral techniques. However, there is another form of the string action
which is classically equivalent to the Nambu-Goto action. It eliminates the square root
at the expense of introducing another field,
1 2
Z
S=
d gg X X (1.22)
4
where g det g. This is the Polyakov action. (Polyakov didnt discover the action, but
he understood how to work with it in the path integral, and for this reason it carries
his name. The path integral treatment of this action will be the subject of Chapter 5).

18
 The new field is g . It is a dynamical metric on the worldsheet. From the perspective
of the worldsheet, the Polyakov action is a bunch of scalar fields X coupled to 2d gravity.

The equation of motion for X is

( gg X ) = 0 , (1.23)

which coincides with the equation of motion (1.21) from the Nambu-Goto action, except
that g is now an independent variable which is fixed by its own equation of motion. To

determine this, we vary the action (remembering again that g = 21 gg g =

+ 21 gg g ),

T
Z
d2 g g X X 1
g g g X X = 0 .(1.24)


S = 2
2

The worldsheet metric is therefore given by,

g = 2f () X X , (1.25)

where the function f () is given by,

f 1 = g X X

A comment on the potentially ambiguous notation: here, and below, any function f ()
is always short-hand for f (, ): it in no way implies that f depends only on the spatial
worldsheet coordinate.

We see that g isnt quite the same as the pull-back metric defined in equation
(1.12); the two differ by the conformal factor f . However, this doesnt matter because,
rather remarkably, f drops out of the equation of motion (1.23). This is because the

g term scales as f , while the inverse metric g scales as f 1 and the two pieces
cancel. We therefore see that Nambu-Goto and the Polyakov actions result in the same
equation of motion for X.

In fact, we can see more directly that the Nambu-Goto and Polyakov actions coincide.
We may replace g in the Polyakov action (1.22) with its equation of motion g =
2f . The factor of f also drops out of the action for the same reason that it dropped
out of the equation of motion. In this manner, we recover the Nambu-Goto action
(1.13).

19
1.3.1 Symmetries of the Polyakov Action
The fact that the presence of the factor f (, ) in (1.25) didnt actually affect the
equations of motion for X reflects the existence of an extra symmetry which the
Polyakov action enjoys. Lets look more closely at this. Firstly, the Polyakov action
still has the two symmetries of the Nambu-Goto action,
Poincare invariance. This is a global symmetry on the worldsheet.

X X + c .

Reparameterization invariance, also known as diffeomorphisms. This is a gauge

symmetry on the worldsheet. We may redefine the worldsheet coordinates as
(). The fields X transform as worldsheet scalars, while g transforms
in the manner appropriate for a 2d metric.

X () X () = X ()

g () g () = g ()

It will sometimes be useful to work infinitesimally. If we make the coordinate
change = (), for some small . The transformations of the
fields then become,

X () = X
g () = +

where the covariant derivative is defined by = with the Levi-

Civita connection associated to the worldsheet metric given by the usual expres-
sion,

= 21 g ( g + g g )

Together with these familiar symmetries, there is also a new symmetry which is novel
to the Polyakov action. It is called Weyl invariance.
Weyl Invariance. Under this symmetry, X () X (), while the metric
changes as

g () 2 () g () . (1.26)

Or, infinitesimally, we can write 2 () = e2() for small so that

g () = 2() g () .

20
 It is simple to see that the Polyakov action is invariant under this transformation:
the factor of 2 drops out just as the factor of f did in equation (1.25), canceling

between g and the inverse metric g . This is a gauge symmetry of the string,
as seen by the fact that the parameter depends on the worldsheet coordinates
. This means that two metrics which are related by a Weyl transformation (1.26)
are to be considered as the same physical state.

Figure 7: An example of a Weyl transformation

How should we think of Weyl invariance? It is not a coordinate change. Instead it is

the invariance of the theory under a local change of scale which preserves the angles
between all lines. For example the two worldsheet metrics shown in the figure are
viewed by the Polyakov string as equivalent. This is rather surprising! And, as you
might imagine, theories with this property are extremely rare. It should be clear from
the discussion above that the property of Weyl invariance is special to two dimensions,

for only there does the scaling factor coming from the determinant g cancel that
coming from the inverse metric. But even in two dimensions, if we wish to keep Weyl
invariance then we are strictly limited in the kind of interactions that can be added to
the action. For example, we would not be allowed a potential term for the worldsheet
scalars of the form,

Z
d2 g V (X) .

These break Weyl invariance. Nor can we add a worldsheet cosmological constant term,

Z
d2 g .

This too breaks Weyl invariance. We will see later in this course that the requirement
of Weyl invariance becomes even more stringent in the quantum theory. We will also
see what kind of interactions terms can be added to the worldsheet. Indeed, much of
this course can be thought of as the study of theories with Weyl invariance.

21
1.3.2 Fixing a Gauge
As we have seen, the equation of motion (1.23) looks pretty nasty. However, we can use
the redundancy inherent in the gauge symmetry to choose coordinates in which they
simplify. Lets think about what we can do with the gauge symmetry.

Firstly, we have two reparameterizations to play with. The worldsheet metric has
three independent components. This means that we expect to be able to set any two of
the metric components to a value of our choosing. We will choose to make the metric
locally conformally flat, meaning
g = e2 , (1.27)
where (, ) is some function on the worldsheet. You can check that this is possible
by writing down the change of the metric under a coordinate transformation and seeing
that the differential equations which result from the condition (1.27) have solutions, at
least locally. Choosing a metric of the form (1.27) is known as conformal gauge.

We have only used reparameterization invariance to get to the metric (1.27). We still
have Weyl transformations to play with. Clearly, we can use these to remove the last
independent component of the metric and set = 0 such that,
g = . (1.28)
We end up with the flat metric on the worldsheet in Minkowski coordinates.

A Diversion: How to make a metric flat

The fact that we can use Weyl invariance to make any two-dimensional metric flat is
an important result. Lets take a quick diversion from our main discussion to see a
different proof that isnt tied to the choice of Minkowski coordinates on the worldsheet.
Well work in 2d Euclidean space to avoid annoying minus signs. Consider two metrics
related by a Weyl transformation, g
= e2 g . One can check that the Ricci scalars
of the two metrics are related by,
p
g R = g(R 22 ) . (1.29)
We can therefore pick a such that the new metric has vanishing Ricci scalar, R = 0,
simply by solving this differential equation for . However, in two dimensions (but
not in higher dimensions) a vanishing Ricci scalar implies a flat metric. The reason is
simply that there arent too many indices to play with. In particular, symmetry of the
Riemann tensor in two dimensions means that it must take the form,
R
R = (g g g g ) .
2

22
So R = 0 is enough to ensure that R

= 0, which means that the manifold is flat. In
equation (1.28), weve further used reparameterization invariance to pick coordinates
in which the flat metric is the Minkowski metric.

The equations of motion and the stress-energy tensor

With the choice of the flat metric (1.28), the Polyakov action simplifies tremendously
and becomes the theory of D free scalar fields. (In fact, this simplification happens in
any conformal gauge).

1
Z
S= d2 X X , (1.30)
4
and the equations of motion for X reduce to the free wave equation,

X = 0 . (1.31)

Now that looks too good to be true! Are the horrible equations (1.23) really equivalent
to a free wave equation? Well, not quite. There is something that weve forgotten:
we picked a choice of gauge for the metric g . But we must still make sure that the
equation of motion for g is satisfied. In fact, the variation of the action with respect
to the metric gives rise to a rather special quantity: it is the stress-energy tensor, T .
With a particular choice of normalization convention, we define the stress-energy tensor
to be
2 1 S
T = .
T g g

We varied the Polyakov action with respect to g in (1.24). When we set g =

we get

T = X X 21 X X . (1.32)

The equation of motion associated to the metric g is simply T = 0. Or, more

explicitly,

T01 = X X = 0
T00 = T11 = 21 (X 2 + X 2 ) = 0 . (1.33)

We therefore learn that the equations of motion of the string are the free wave equations
(1.31) subject to the two constraints (1.33) arising from the equation of motion T = 0.

23
Getting a feel for the constraints
Lets try to get some intuition for these constraints. There is a simple
meaning of the first constraint in (1.33): we must choose our parame-
terization such that lines of constant are perpendicular to the lines
of constant , as shown in the figure.

But we can do better. To gain more physical insight, we need to make

use of the fact that we havent quite exhausted our gauge symmetry.
We will discuss this more in Section 2.2, but for now one can check that Figure 8:
there is enough remnant gauge symmetry to allow us to go to static
gauge,

X 0 t = R ,

so that (X 0 ) = 0 and X 0 = R, where R is a constant that is needed on dimensional

grounds. The interpretation of this constant will become clear shortly. Then, writing
X = (t, ~x), the equation of motion for spatial components is the free wave equation,

~x = 0
~x

while the constraints become

~x ~x = 0
~x 2 + ~x 2 = R2 (1.34)

The first constraint tells us that the motion of the string must be perpendicular to the
string itself. In other words, the physical modes of the string are transverse oscillations.
There is no longitudinal mode. Well also see this again in Section 2.2.

From the second constraint, we can understand the meaning of the constant R: it is
related to the length of the string when ~x = 0,
Z p
d (d~x/d)2 = 2R .

Of course, if we have a stretched string with ~x = 0 at one moment of time, then it wont
stay like that for long. It will contract under its own tension. As this happens, the
second constraint equation relates the length of the string to the instantaneous velocity
of the string.

24
1.4 Mode Expansions
Lets look at the equations of motion and constraints more closely. The equations of
motion (1.31) are easily solved. We introduce lightcone coordinates on the worldsheet,
= ,
in terms of which the equations of motion simply read
+ X = 0
The most general solution is,
X (, ) = XL ( + ) + XR ( )
for arbitrary functions XL and XR . These describe left-moving and right-moving waves
respectively. Of course the solution must still obey both the constraints (1.33) as well
as the periodicity condition,
X (, ) = X ( + 2, ) . (1.35)
The most general, periodic solution can be expanded in Fourier modes,
r
+ 1 1 + X 1 in+
XL ( ) = 2 x + 2 p + i e ,
2 n6=0 n n
r
1 1 X 1 in
XR ( ) = 2 x + 2 p + i e . (1.36)
2 n6=0 n n

This mode expansion will be very important when we come to the quantum theory.
Lets make a few simple comments here.
Various normalizations in this expression, such as the and factor of 1/n have
been chosen for later convenience.

XL and XR do not individually satisfy the periodicity condition (1.35) due to the
terms linear in . However, the sum of them is invariant under + 2 as
required.

The variables x and p are the position and momentum of the center of mass of
the string. This can be checked, for example, by studying the Noether currents
arising from the spacetime translation symmetry X X + c . One finds that
the conserved charge is indeed p .

Reality of X requires that the coefficients of the Fourier modes, n and n , obey

n = (n ) , n = (n ) . (1.37)

25
1.4.1 The Constraints Revisited
We still have to impose the two constraints (1.33). In the worldsheet lightcone coordi-
nates , these become,

(+ X)2 = ( X)2 = 0 . (1.38)

These equations give constraints on the momenta p and the Fourier modes n and n .
To see what these are, lets look at
r

X in
X = XR = p + e
2 2 n6=0 n
r
X in
= e
2 n n

where in the second line the sum is over all n Z, and we have defined 0 to be
r

0 p .
2
The constraint (1.38) can then be written as
X
( X)2 = m p ei(m+p)

2 m,p
X
m nm ein

=
2 m,n
X
Ln ein = 0 .

where we have defined the sum of oscillator modes,

1X
Ln = nm m . (1.39)
2 m

We can also do the same for the left-moving modes, where we again define an analogous
sum of operator modes,
1X
Ln = nm m . (1.40)
2 m

with the zero mode defined to be,

r

0 p .
2

26
The fact that 0 = 0 looks innocuous but is a key point to remember when we come
to quantize the string. The Ln and Ln are the Fourier modes of the constraints. Any
classical solution of the string of the form (1.36) must further obey the infinite number
of constraints,

Ln = Ln = 0 nZ.

Well meet these objects Ln and Ln again in a more general context when we come to
discuss conformal field theory.

The constraints arising from L0 and L0 have a rather special interpretation. This is
because they include the square of the spacetime momentum p . But, the square of the
spacetime momentum is an important quantity in Minkowski space: it is the square of
the rest mass of a particle,

p p = M 2 .

So the L0 and L0 constraints tell us the effective mass of a string in terms of the excited
oscillator modes, namely
4 X 4 X
M2 = n n = n n (1.41)
n>0 n>0

Because both 0 and 0 are equal to /2 p , we have two expressions for the invariant
p

mass: one in terms of right-moving oscillators n and one in terms of left-moving

oscillators n . And these two terms must be equal to each other. This is known as
level matching. It will play an important role in the next section where we turn to the
quantum theory.

27