Proton stability in superstring derived models

Abstract

I discuss the problem of proton decay, from dimension four, five and six operators, in superstring derived standard--like models. I classify the sectors that produce color triplet superfields which may generate proton decay from dimension five and six operators. I show that for two of these sectors there exist a unique superstring doublet--triplet splitting mechanism that projects out the color triplets by means of the GSO projection, while leaving the electroweak doublets in the physical spectrum. I investigate possible proton decay due to additional color triplets in the massless spectrum and due to nonrenormalizable terms. I show that there exist models in which the dimension four, five and six operators, that lead to proton decay, are forbidden by the symmetries of the string models, to all orders of nonrenormalizable terms.