Strings Hamburg Summer School – Particles, Strings & Cosmology

Exercise Sheet 1 Dr. Emanuel Malek

Strings
Hamburg Summer School – Particles, Strings & Cosmology
Dr. Emanuel Malek

Exercise Sheet 1

1 Consider a coordinate change

xµ −→ x0µ . (1.1)
Recall that the components of tensors transform in a well-defined way under the coordinate
change (1.1). For example, the components of a (1, 1) tensor T µ ν transform under (1.1) as

∂x0µ ∂xσ ρ
T µ ν −→ T 0µ ν = T σ. (1.2)
∂xρ ∂x0ν

Similarly, the components of a (1, 1) tensor density T̃ µ ν of weight w transforms under (1.1) as

∂x0µ ∂xσ ρ
T̃ µ ν −→ T̃ 0µ ν = |J|w T σ, (1.3)
∂xρ ∂x0ν
∂xµ


where J = det ∂x 0ν is the Jacobian of the coordinate change (1.1).
Given a (2, 0) tensor Sµν , show that (detSµν )1/2 is a scalar density of weight 1.

2 Consider the action for a field φ(x) in a d-dimensional spacetime with Minkowski metric
ηµν = (−1, +1, . . . , +1). The action is given in terms of the Lagrangian density by
Z
S[φ] = dd x L(φ(x), ∂µ φ(x)) . (2.1)

(a) Use integration by parts and assume that you can neglect boundary terms, to show that the
action is minimised δS = 0 for field configurations satisfying the Euler-Lagrange equations
 
∂L ∂L
∂µ = . (2.2)
∂(∂µ φ) ∂φ

(b) Consider the Klein-Gordon action for a massive scalar field φ in d dimensions with Minkowski
metric Z
1
dd x ∂µ φ ∂ µ φ + m2 φ2


S=− (2.3)
2
Use the action (2.3) to compute the Euler-Lagrange equations for the scalar field φ.

3 Consider the following 1-dimensional action

Z
1  
S= dτ e−1 Ẋ µ Ẋ ν ηµν − e m2 , (3.1)
2 P
µ
where X µ (τ ), e(τ ) are dynamical fields, Ẋ µ = dX
dτ , m is a constant and ηµν is the Minkowski
metric with µ = 0, . . . , n.
(a) Given that X µ (τ ) are scalar fields, how does e have to transform under reparameterisations

τ −→ τ̃ (τ ) , (3.2)

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Strings Hamburg Summer School – Particles, Strings & Cosmology
Exercise Sheet 1 Dr. Emanuel Malek

such that the action (3.1) is invariant?

(b) Show that the equations of motion for e imply
e2 m2 + Ẋ µ Ẋ ν ηµν = 0 . (3.3)
Plug (3.3) back into the action (3.1) to show that the action is equivalent to
Z q
S = −m dτ −Ẋ µ Ẋ ν ηµν . (3.4)
P

This is the world-line action of a point-particle in Minkowski space.

(c) Compute the equation of motion for the action (3.4). Write the equation of motion in terms
of the canonical momentum for X µ ,
δS
Πµ = , (3.5)
δ Ẋ µ
and interpet this equation.
(d) Consider a point-particle moving in a curved space-time (M, g), i.e.
Z q
S = −m dτ −Ẋ µ Ẋ ν gµν . (3.6)
P

Show that the equation of motion of (3.6) is given by

d2 X µ ν
µ dX dX
ρ
+ Γ νρ = 0, (3.7)
ds2 ds ds
where q
ds = −Ẋ µ Ẋ ν gµν dτ , (3.8)
and Γµνρ are the Christoffel symbols given explicitly by
1
Γµνρ = g µσ (∂ν gρσ + ∂ρ gνσ − ∂σ gνρ ) . (3.9)
2
Interpret this equation of motion.

4 Consider the Polyakov-style action for a massless relativistic point-particle

Z
1
S= dτ e−1 Ẋ µ Ẋ ν ηµν . (4.1)
2 P
(a) Compute the equations of motion for this action.
(b) Use reparameterisation invariance to gauge-fix e(τ ).
(c) Evaluate the gauge-fixed equations of motion and interpret them.

5 Consider an action S[φ, g] that is Weyl invariant, i.e. invariant under

gµν −→ Ω2 (x)gµν . (5.1)
Show that the stress-energy tensor must be traceless:
T µµ = 0 . (5.2)
Hint: Use the definition of the stress-energy tensor as
2 δS
T µν = − √ . (5.3)
−g δgµν

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Strings Hamburg Summer School – Particles, Strings & Cosmology
Exercise Sheet 1 Dr. Emanuel Malek

6 Optional: String theory also contains a set of higher-dimensional objects, called branes.
A (p + 1)-dimensional brane, is called a p-brane. The dynamics of these objects in Minkowski
space is determined by the Dirac action
Z p
S = −T dp+1 σ − det γ , (6.1)
Σp+1

where Σp+1 denotes the worldvolume of the p-brane, X : Σp+1 ,→ R1,D−1 defines its embedding,
σ α , α = 0, . . . , p are local coordinates on Σp+1 and η is the Minkowski metric on R1,D−1 . As
usual, γ is the pull-back metric on Σp+1 defined as

∂X µ ∂X ν
γαβ = ηµν . (6.2)
∂σ α ∂σ β
Show that the Dirac action (6.1) is equivalent to the Polyakov-style action
Z
T p  
S=− dp+1 σ − det g g αβ ∂α X µ ∂β X ν ηµν − (p − 1) , (6.3)
2 Σp+1

where gαβ is a dynamical worldvolume metric.

7 Optional: Some extra GR questions, which are useful for the course.
(a) Use the fact that a metric tensor gµν is diagonalisable to show that
p 1p
δ − det g = − det g g µν δgµν . (7.1)
2
(b) Consider a vector V µ , use the form of the Levi-Civita connection to show that
1 p 
∇µ V µ = √ ∂µ − det g V µ . (7.2)
− det g
0 = e2φ g
(c) Show that in 2 dimensions, the transformation gαβ → gαβ αβ causes the Ricci scalar
to transform as
− det g 0 R0 = − det g R − 2∇2 φ .
p p

(7.3)
Argue that in 2 dimensions, we can always perform a Weyl rescaling
0
gαβ → gαβ = e2φ gαβ , (7.4)

such that R0 = 0.
(d) Note that in 2 dimensions, the Bianchi identities and symmetry properties of the Riemann
curvature tensor imply that it is completely determined by the Ricci scalar:
R
Rαβγδ = (gαγ gβδ − gαδ gβγ ) . (7.5)
2
What does this, together with the result from (c), imply about the possible form of the metric
0 ?
gαβ

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Strings Hamburg Summer School – Particles, Strings & Cosmology
Exercise Sheet 1 Dr. Emanuel Malek

8 Optional: Some extra field theory questions. These require knowledge of Noether’s theo-
rem and the Lie derivative.
Consider the Klein-Gordon action for a massive scalar field φ in d dimensions with Minkowski
metric Z
1
dd x ∂µ φ ∂ µ φ + m2 φ2


S=− (8.1)
2
(a) Show that the action (8.1) is invariant under translations and use Noether’s Theorem to
compute the stress-energy tensor associated with this translation invariance.
(b) Compute the stress-energy tensor in the following alternative way. Consider a position-
dependent translation
xµ −→ xµ + µ (x) . (8.2)
The variation of the action (8.1) takes the form
Z
δS = dd x T µν ∂µ ν . (8.3)

Compute T µν from (8.3).

(c) Convince yourself that the variation of any translation-invariant action under a position-
dependent translation (8.2) must take the form (8.3). Moreover, use (8.3) to argue that Tµν
must be conserved when the equations of motion hold.
Hint: Consider what happens when  is constant and what it means for the action to be
extremised.
(d) Compute the stress-energy tensor in the following alternative way. Minimally couple the
Klein-Gordon action to a dynamical metric gµν and compute the stress-energy tensor via

2 δS
Tµν = − √ , (8.4)
−g δg µν g=η

where |g=η denotes that we are evaluating with the metric g set to the Minkowski metric η.
(e) Think about the translation-dependent shift (8.2) as a diffeomorphism to show that the
stress-energy tensors computed in (8.3) and (8.4) must be the same for any action.

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