Consistency between 11D and U-duality

Abstract

U duality transformations must act on a basis of states that form complete multiplets of the U group, at any coupling, even though the states may not be mass degenerate, as for a broken symmetry. Similarly, if superstring theory is related to a non-perturbative 11D M-theory, then an 11D supermultiplet structure is expected, even though the multiplet may contain states of different masses. We analyse the consistency between these two multiplet schemes at the higher excited string levels for various compactifications of the type IIA superstring. While we find complete consistency for a number of compactifications, there remain some unanswered questions in others. The relation to D-branes also needs further clarification.