Volume 250, number 1,2 PHYSICS LETTERS B 1 November 1990

Non-polynomial closed string field theory:

loops and conformal maps
Long Hua
Physics Department, New York University, 4 Washington Place, New York, NY 10003, USA

and

Michio Kaku ~,2

Institutefor Advanced Study, Princeton, NJ 08540, USA

Received 23 March 1990; revised manuscript received 17 June 1990

Recently, we proposed the complete classical action for the non-polynomial closed string field theory, which successfully repro-
duced all closed string tree amplitudes. (The action was simultaneously proposed by the Kyoto group. ) In this paper, we analyze
the structure of the theory. We (a) compute the explicit conformal map for all g-loop, p-puncture diagrams, (b) compute all one-
loop, two-puncture maps in terms of hyper-elliptic functions, and (c) analyze their modular structure. We analyze, but do not
resolve, the question of modular invariance.

1. Introduction theory was subsequently analyzed in refs. [ 10-12 ].

String field theory [ 1,2 ] holds the p r o m i s e o f giv-
ing us a n o n - p e r t u r b a t i v e a p p r o a c h to string theory.
However, one e m b a r r a s s m e n t has been the lack o f a
consistent covariant closed string field theory. Spe-
cifically, a naive a t t e m p t to generalize ref. [ 2 ] leads
to a missing region [3] o f m o d u l i space for the
S h a p i r o - V i r a s o r o amplitude. In refs.[4,5], we
showed, analytically and by computer, that this miss-
ing region can be precisely filled by a d d i n g a four-
string t e t r a h e d r o n graph to the action. C o n f o r m a l ar-
guments showed that the action m u s t be non-poly-
nomial [ 6 ].
Subsequently, one o f us ( M . K . ) showed how to
generalize this action to all orders, using n-sided po-
lyhedra [7 ]. A slightly different action was simulta-
neously p r o p o s e d in ref. [ 8 ] ~l. The structure o f the
a Permanent address: City College of the City University of New
York, NY 10031, USA.
2 Work supported in part by NSF-PHY-8615338, NSF-INT-
8715626, CUNY-FRAP-6-6693347, and DE-FG02-
90ER40542.
~t See also the early work of Saadi and Zwiebach [9].
We presented two proofs o f the correctness o f the the-
pry. The first p r o o f [ 10 ] used brute force, d e m o n -
strating BRST invariance to n = 8 level. This p r o o f
was greatly complicated by the fact that there are more
than one n-sided polyhedra for n >~6. In fact, for n = 6,
we have two polyhedra, for n = 7 we have five poly-
hedra, and at n = 8 we have 14 polyhedra. The second
p r o o f [ 12 ] was much m o r e elegant, valid to all or-
ders, using geometric string field theory [ 13 ] to gen-
erate the n o n - p o l y n o m i a l action from a p o l y n o m i a l
action.
In this paper, we present new results, giving the ex-
plicit conformal maps for all g-loop, p-puncture dia-
grams using the m e r o m o r p h i c properties o f O func-
tions. In particular, we will analyze the case o f g = 1
and p = 2 , study its m o d u l a r properties, and com-
m e n t on them.
Let us briefly review the n o n - p o l y n o m i a l theory,
whose action is given by
L=(~UlQ~)+ ~ o~,(~vn). (1.1)
n=3

56 0370-2693/90/$ 03.50 © 1990 - Elsevier Science Publishers B.V. ( North-Holland )

Volume 250, number 1,2 PHYSICS LETTERS B 1 November 1990

The coefficients can be calculated by demanding that carefully analyzing uniqueness arguments. We wish
it be invariant under to have (i) a conformal map whose square trans-
forms as a quadratic differential, (ii) a map whose
~I~)=QIA>+ ~ P.I ~"A>. (1.2) only singularities are double poles at p points y~, and
n=l
whose only zeros are 2 p + 4 g - 4 points vi, (iii) a
Let the ith polygon with n faces be (n)~. Then the function defined on the Picard torus, so that the point
( ~ " ) is the sum over all (n), polyhedra: ( ~"> -= z going around any a-cycle or b-cycle will return back
Zi=lC(rl)i(~")i, ( ~n)i--= ( n ! ) - l ( ~[l [ ( ~21... to the same point.
× ( 5P,~l V~,), ) normalized so the three-tachyon ver- Let us start with the first abelian differentials (_Di
tex is equal to I, and where the vertex I V<,,),) satis- defined on the torus, f2 is the period matrix, which
fies the Goto-Naka continuity conditions for the (n) i obeys
polyhedra [ 10]. The calculation of the coefficients
0~,,/~,, and c(n)~ is long and tedious because of the
Oij=~O)i, (~ij=~O)j.
bj aj
(2.2)
many polyhedra that exist at each level, but the final
result is simple: Let n be a g-component vector with integer entries.
( ~u">i Then the generalized O function and prime form
L=½(~IQ~)+ ~ E~ (2g) n-2 s(n)~ '
,=3 (1.3) E(z', z) can be defined as [4,14]

where s(n)~ equals the number of distinct ways that O(zlf2) = ~ exp(innT£2n+2ninTz),
n~Zg
a solid polyhedron can be rotated into itself. Remark-
ably, for g = 1/2, the coefficient of each polyhedron
is exactly one! (The deeper meaning of this surpris-
ing result is explained in ref. [ 12 ]. )
O[~] (f~, coil2) (2.3)
e(z', z)= x/h [~1 (z)h[~] (z')'
2. Conformal map for p-puncture, genus-g diagram
where
For the scattering of four closed strings (with equal
circumference) at the tree and one-loop level, the
conformal map is easy to write down. For the tree
hi;](z)= i~00[~](0[~r2)°9i(z)'=,
Ozi (2.4,

amplitude, the Schwarz-Christoffel transformation

gives us the following map: where a and fl label the spin structure on the
Riemann surface. (The prime form's dependence on
dp I] 4 ( z - v i ) 1/2 the spin structure will drop out. )
=N ,=l (2.1)
dz I-[~=, (z-~,j) ' We will also make use of the celebrated Riemann
vanishing theorem [ 14,15 ], which allows us to com-
where the points y, are mapped to infinity and repre-
sent external strings, while Riemann cuts connecting pute the zeros of the O function. It states that the
the various v~ represent the interaction, i.e. the line function
along which two closed strings merge into a third. g

To obtain the one-loop amplitude, one need only

alter the map slightly, such as replacing the various
O(,o+Io,o) ,2,,
gO
factors z-z~ in the above map with 0~ (z-z~).
However, for higher loops, replacing 0~ with the for fixed eo either vanishes identically, or has g zeros
generalized O function fails to yield the conformal located at the points z~ and which satisfy
map for the genus-g conformal map. The generaliza- gi
tion to the arbitrary case is non-trivial.
f to= - e o +A~o+n+g2m, (2.6)
As a result, we will derive the conformal map i=l
zo
dp=co=dz for the g-handle, p-puncture graph by

57
Volume 250, number 1,2
(azo)j=l--½~'~jj+ ~ O,)i(Z ) O,)j(W).
i= l;i¢j
ai zo
(2.6 cont'd)
The essential observation, as we made earlier, is
that with O and E(z, z' ) alone, we cannot satisfy
constraints (i), (ii), and (iii). The key step (for the
open string case) was made in ref. [ 16 ], where it was
noticed that these requirements could be satisfied by
introducing yet another function, the a(z) function
of refs. [ 15,17 ] where
a(z)=exp ( - i~=,~ og,(z' ) ln E(z', z) ) •
ai
We now note that the prime form E(z', z) trans-
forms as a - 1/2 differential in z, that O is locally a
zero differential, and that a transforms as a g/2
differential.
E(z', z) has a zero at z' = z but no poles, a has no
zeros or poles, and O, by the Riemann vanishing
theorem, can have g zeros [ 4,14 ].
Then there is one unique combination of the O,
prime form, and a function which transforms as a
quadratic differential and has the correct zero and
pole structure,
zo zo
1-Ii=~+ 1 E(z, vilQ)
2p+4g--4
× ~jP--[~,~-jI-~ la(z)13"
Notice that the differential has the correct order,
- ½( 2 p + 3 g - 4 ) + p + a g = 2.
The conformal map is then found by taking the in-
tegral of the square root of the map. Because of the
prime forms E(z', z) in the denominator, the double
poles, corresponding to the p punctures, are located
at Y~. Furthermore, the 2 p + 4 g - 4 zeros at v~ come
from the O function and the prime forms in the
numerator.
Finally, we demand that the function be periodic
as z moves around the various handles. This, in turn,
places g additional complex constraints on the
parameters,
58
PHYSICS LETTERSB 1 November 1990
Vi 7r
E ooj-2 ~oj = 4 (zlzo)j- 2. (2.9)
i=1 r=l
z0 z0
(at first, the map (2.8) seems to be unsymmetrical
with respect to the various vi, since some of them are
to be found within the O function and others within
the prime form. However, by simply redefining the
constant N, we can interchange the various v, and
show that the function is really symmetrical in all vi. )
Now that we have explicitly constructed the con-
formal map for the theory for arbitrary genus g and
puncture p, let us count modular parameters and ver-
ify that we have the correct counting. In general, we
(2.7) want the total number of unknowns, contained within
the complex parameters in the map, to be equal to the
sum of the dimension of moduli space ( 6 g - 6 + 2p)
plus the number of constraints we place on the com-
plex parameters to fix the overall shape of the confor-
mal surface, i.e.
#unknowns=#constraints+#moduli. (2.10)
This equation is easily checked. The complex vari-
ables N, y~, and v, contain a total of 2, 2p, 2 ( 2 p +
4 g - 4 ) unknowns, respectively. In addition, the
multi-loop Riemann surface is fixed by g complex
projective transformations, each containing six pa-
rameters. Thus, the total number of unknowns in the
conformal map is equal to 6 p - 6 + 14g.
Furthermore, the dimension of moduli space is
equal to 6 g - 6 + 2p. Also, the number of constraints
can be broken down as follows: (a) six come from
fixing the overall projective transformations on the
(2.8)
complex plane, (b) 2p come from fixing the residue
of the pole at each y~to be a real number + 2n, which
fixes the circumference of each cylinder, (c)
2 (p + 3 g - 2 ) come from fixing the real and imagi-
nary parts of the various Riemann cuts to conform to
the geometry of a closed string scattering amplitude.
(To see this, let us pair off the internal turning points,
so that vi and vj form the ends o f a Riemann cut. Then
we fix
~zdZ= +in. (2.11)
IPi
This places the Riemann cut vertically in the com-
plex p plane. It also sets _+in to be the height of the
Volume 250, number 1,2 PHYSICSLETTERSB 1 November 1990

cut. We then have 2 ( p - 2 ) conditions coming from i.e. the light cone limit is singular. However, this is
the external lines, and 4g conditions coming from the incorrect. By explicit computation, one can show that
internal loops. We also have another 2g conditions one can smoothly take the limit in the conformal map
coming from the fact that the line integral in (2.11 ) (2.8) and reach the light cone configuration, as pre-
can move directly up from 1,ito l,j, or can wind around dicted in geometric string field theory [ 13 ]. )
the corresponding hole or handle in the conformal
surface. )
Lastly, we have 2g conditions coming from (2.9), 3. O n e - l o o p , two-puncture results
and we must also subtract two from the number of
constraints. This is because the system is actually
Notice that the conformal map is general enough
over-constrained. (The sum of the residues at 7j plus
to include vacuum graphs, such as the one-loop tad-
the line integral around the Riemann cuts equals
pole, where the residues of the poles do not have to
zero.) Putting everything together, we now have
sum to zero.
4p + 8g constraints.
Let us specialize to the case of g = 1. Then a(z) = 1,
In sum, the total number of unknowns
Azo= ½ - ½z and
(6p + 1 4 g - 6 ) equals the sum of the number of mod-
uli ( 6 g - 6 + 2 p ) plus the number of constraints E(z, w) = 2 n i v / ~ O[ I/A]([ln(z/w)/2m]lt2)
(4p+ 8g), as expected. o[l{~] (0It2)
The conformal map also accommodates the possi-
bility of arbitrary polyhedra occurring within a loop (3.1)
amplitude. Polyhedra occur when the real parts of The the map for the g = l, p-puncture diagram is
several pairs of Riemann cuts coincide, and the dif-
ference of their imaginary parts no longer equals n. dp _NX/1-[f=, O,(z- ui) 01(z-Oi)
(3.2)
Since each u~ is mapped onto a vertex o f a polyhedra, dz 1 ~ = 1 01(Z--7i) '
then the various edges within the polyhedra can have
varying lengths, corresponding to varying differences where ~i and tT, are the splitting points and ~,, the
between the imaginary parts ofp (t,~). punctures and
For example, the conformal map can create a po- N= 0'1 (O)I~f=z 01(7,-Y~)
lyhedron with M vertices by having the real parts of
~/1-I~=, 01 (Yl - ~'i) 01 (n -E) "
M/2 pairs of Riemann cuts all have the same value
Re p(t,i). By varying the differences in their imagi- To check the correctness of our formalism, let us
nary parts, one can vary the lengths of the edges of show the equivalence of our 0 function result with
the polyhedra. the simplest known hyper-elliptic case, g = 1 and p = 1
In this way, by clustering pairs of Riemann cuts lo- [181:
cated at ~'i into different groups, we can create poly-
hedra of arbitrary complexity within a loop diagram. dp - N x/~ (N= ½). (3.3)
(As an aside, notice that the map (2.8) is so gen- dz x/z(z- 1 ) (z--x)
eral that we can also accommodate all possible light Let us first change variable z = t 2. Now, define
cone configurations as well by changing boundary
conditions. By letting the external strings have arbi- kZ= llx=04104,
trary circumferences and by collapsing all pairs of
t= (03/02)01 ( u)/04( u),
Riemann cuts into single points, we find that the sum
of the residues of the poles equals zero, thus repro- u=ulO~,
ducing the boundary conditions of the light cone the-
pry. Furthermore, it is commonly thought that one
cannot smoothly distort a theory where strings inter-
u= i ~/(1 _t~)(l_k~:),
0
a,
act at their mid-points into a theory where strings in-
E =0/(0).
teract at their endpoints, as in the light cone theory,

59
Volume 250, number 1,2 PHYSICS LETTERSB 1 November 1990

Using standard theta-function relations [19 ], one 1

finds f dz, / y Z ( 1 - z-z

)(x-z)
0
l _ t Z = 02(u) 0]
0~ 0~(v) '
= +,2 x/z(1-z)(½-z+ia)dZ
1 - k 2 t 2 = 02(v) 02
o~ o~,(v) '
03 O?~02(v) 03(v) dr. =2 f dt
o 1 ~ - t2 {exp [i(0b - 0a) ]
dt= (3.4)
02 O~(v)
Rb
Also, define + e x p [ --i(0b-- 0a) ]} ~ =2n, (3.8)

(o3 o3 o4( ' 2 (3.5) which fixes a as a function of b, and where

Rb exp (i0b) =X/( ½--t2) +ib,
Put everything together now, one goes back to (3.2), Ra exp (i0~) = x / ( ½- t 2 ) + i a .
as required
We can also move the line integral so that it passes
dp 01(0) through x,
1
dv 01(v'+z/2)
X x / - O ' ( v+ v' + r / 2 ) O~( v - v ' - z / 2 )
(3.6)
2n=~ + x]x/z(z_l)(x_z~dZ
O~(v)
1 i { x/(½-rc°sO)+i(b-sinO)
The constraints are ( T = t + i0) = \~r(rcosO-l+irsinO)(R-r) dr
1

2n= dz z(1-z)(x-z)' x/(-½-rc°sO)+i(b-rsin

, dr)
0 x/rt 1 - r cos 0+ ir sin 0) ( R - r)

vl1 ! ~ R dr
R

T= i dz, / , z ( z - 1 )-z( x - z ) ' (3.7) - {exp[i(Ob--Oa)/2]

1

where t e [ 0 , ~ ] is the length of the loop, while Rb

--exp[--i(Ob--Oa)/2]} R-~" (3.9)
O~[ - n/2, n/2 ] the twist angle.
That the one-puncture tadpole over-covers moduli
From this we can extract the integral from x to 1, and
space can be seen as follows. If x, y are both real in
solve for T via (3.7),
eq. (3.3), then Tis real, so there is no twist. But if x, x
y are complex, then one has twisted diagrams. Specif-
ically, when x = ½+ia, y = ½+ib, one finds T=t+in, Im T = l m x/~z~ 1~_ z) ] =n.
which is the boundary of the integration region. For
this choice, constraint (3.7) can be satisfied Further calculation shows t = Re T decreases when a
decreases. However, it is easy to see that t can never
be zero, namely g> train, SO
tmin=t(a=O)
(1/( X~ x/½+ib-z ) )
=Re dZ__z(z_l)(½_z: . (3.10)

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Volume 250, number 1,2 PHYSICS LETTERS B 1 November 1990

Numerical calculation gives tmi,=2.624. SO we con-

Ys
elude that there is some region in t, 0 space which
cannot be m a p p e d to x space, i.e. the tadpole graph -Y=
over-covers moduli space.
Our main interest, however, is the case of g = 1 and (a) Y3
p = 2, where we have the diagrams shown in figs. 1a -
1c. We can write this case either in the O function
formalism, or the hyper-elliptie formalism. In the lat-
ter case, the m a p is given by
Yl k_,
"Y2
dp =N x/(z-Y)(z-Y) (3.11) Yl ~0 1
dz (z+y2)x/z(z-1)(z-x)"
,ll
For different parameters, this m a p will correspond (b)
to the three different diagrams in figs. l a - l c . (Here-
after, we only talk about diagrams with no twist, i.e. Fig. 2. (a) Hyper-eUiptic mapping for fig. la. In z space, there is
T~, Tz are both real. To allow twists, so that TI, T2 a cut between [0, 1], [x, co], and also [Yl,Y3]. (b) In thepplane,
only sheet 1 is shown. Sheet 2 attaches to sheet 1 along cuts [0, 1]
become complex, one can change all the real vari-
and Ix oo ].
ables in the maps to be complex. )
When y = b + ia, 37= 37 (a, b real ), we obtain the m a p
The diagram in fig. lc (3c) is obtained when Y=Yt,
from fig. 2a to the (double sheeted) complex plane
)3=y 3 (fig. 3 ), where Yl, Y3 are real,
in fig. 2b,
1 1
x/(z_b)Z+a 2 rt=Nz ! x/(Yl-z)(Y3-Z)
u=N, (z+yz)~/z(l-z)(x-z) dz, (3.12) (z+Y2)x/z(l_z)(x_z) dz, (3.17)

yt
x/(z_b)Z+a z ½T, =U2 i x/(Y' - z ) (y3 - z ) dz, (3.18)
½T, =N, (z+y2)~/z(z-l)(x-z) dz, (3.13) , (z+y2)x/z(z- 1)(x-z)
y3

½Tz=N, i x/(z-b)Z+a2 4(y,

P

7"2=N~ J (z+y2)x/z(z_l)(z_x)
I ~ ) ~y3 I Z~

y, (z+yz)x/z(z_l)(x_z) dz, (3.14)

dz, (3.19)
yl
yl
y3 ,/(z-y,)(y3-z)
½n=Nl ! x/(z-b)Z+a2 ½n=N2 j dz, (3.20)
(z+y2R/z(z_l)(x_z) dz, (3.15) x (z+Y2)x/z(z- 1) (z-x)

where
N2 = x/YE(Y2+ 1) (Yz +x) (3.21)
X/(Y2 +Yl ) (Y2 +Y3)
N, = x/Yz(Y2 + 1) (Y2 +x) (the diagram in fig. lb is a transition diagram from
x/(Y2 +b)Z+a 2 (3.16) la to lc, obtained by letting the image of x, y~, Y3 and
oo gradually have the same real part. These four
points, in turn, form the vertices of the tetrahedron
graph of refs. [4,5 ].)
o- 0 9 Notice that when Y2 ~ 3y3~oo, these equations re-
duce down to (3.3), (3.7), i.e. the one-puncture tad-
(a) (b) (c) pole, which is known to over-count moduli space.
Fig. l. Three loop diagrams which appear at the g= 1, p= 2 level Since the integral from Yz to oo must be infinite, one
in the non-polynomial theory. in fact cannot allow y2--,oo by itself. However, one

61
Volume 250, number 1,2 PHYSICS LETTERS B
" Y2 1 x Yl Y3
(a)
co
- Y=
oo
(b)
(c)
" 0
Fig. 3. (a) Hyper-elliptic mapping for fig. 2c. In z space, there is
a cut between [0, 1 ] and [x, oo ]. (b) Sheet 1 attaches to sheet 2
(not shown ) along these cuts. (c) The fully assembled diagram
for fig. lc, with sheets 1 and 2 sewn together.
should be able to choose a large but finite value of y2
such that, to order O ( 1/Y2), one finds the one-punc-
ture tadpole. Unfortunately, this means that the graph
over-counts moduli space.
4. Discussion
In this paper, we have explicitly written down the
conformal maps for the arbitrary genus-g, p-puncture
surface of the non-polynomial closed string field the-
ory. For g = 1 and p = 2, we have explicitly displayed
the conformal map, both as a O function and as a hy-
per-elliptic function. Unfortunately, by explicit anal-
ysis of the tadpole graph with two punctures, it ap-
pears that it contains the single-puncture tadpole as a
subset, which in turn gives us an infinite over-count-
ing of moduli space. Thus, unfortunately, the non-
polynomial theory is still not yet complete at the
62
1 November 1990
quantum level. (In fact, it can be shown that the the-
ory actually possesses gauge anomalies. New non-po-
lynomial terms must be added to kill both the gauge
anomalies and restore modular invariance [ 20 ]. )
The final resolution, we feel, lies in ref. [ 12 ], where
we derived the tree-level non-polynomial theory from
a higher theory, geometric string field theory, which
is modular invariant. By repeating the derivation,
carefully preserving modular invariance at each step,
one should be able to derive the full, non-polynomial
modular invariant action. This is currently being
studied.
Acknowledgement
One of us (M.K.) would like to thank the hospital-
ity of the Institute for Advanced Study at Princeton
where this work was completed. Also, we would like
to thank S. Samuel, O. Lechtenfeld, D. Gross, and E.
Witten for productive discussions.
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[4] M. Kaku, Phys. Rev. D 38 (1988) 3052.
[ 5 ] M. Kaku and J. Lykken, Phys. Rev. D 38 ( 1988 ) 3067.
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[ 7 ] M. Kaku, in: Functional integration, geometry, and strings,
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