Non-critical Heterotic Superstrings in Various Dimensions

Abstract

We construct heterotic string theories on spacetimes of the form R^{d-1,1} times N=2 linear dilaton, where d=6,4,2,0. There are two lines of supersymmetric theories descending from the two supersymmetric ten-dimensional heterotic theories. These have gauge groups which are lower rank subgroups of E_{8} times E_{8} and SO(32). On turning on a (2,2) deformation which makes the two dimensional part a smooth SL_{2}(R)/U(1) supercoset, the gauge groups get broken further. In the deformed theories, there are non-trivial moduli which are charged under the surviving gauge group in the case of d=6. We construct the marginal operators on the worldsheet corresponding to these moduli.