Non-Perturbative Solutions of String Theory in Gravitational Backgrounds

Abstract

We study bosonic string theory in a gravitational background. We show that either left-movers or right-movers are the only background independent non-perturbative solutions of the field equations for an arbitrary static metric. They are stable and have a conserved topological charge being therefore topological solitons. The action vanishes for these solutions and hence they provide the dominating contribution in a path integral quantization