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AlphaNumeric
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In various textbooks like Polchinski and in papers like Witten hep-th/9503124 they go through the process of starting with the bosonic action (in p-form notation) of M Theory and turning it into the action for IIA string theory.
I understand the process (ie dimensional reduction) which converts one action into another, but I don't understand why looking at just the bosonic part of the action is sufficent, given IIA includes fermions. During the process of compactifying and dimensional reduction the M Theory action splits into various parts, the NS-NS part, the R-R part and the CS part (ie a mixture of NS and R terms). Is it the case that M theory is a purely bosonic theory which then turns into a fermionic one when you reduce to 10 dimensions?
Thanks for any help :)
I understand the process (ie dimensional reduction) which converts one action into another, but I don't understand why looking at just the bosonic part of the action is sufficent, given IIA includes fermions. During the process of compactifying and dimensional reduction the M Theory action splits into various parts, the NS-NS part, the R-R part and the CS part (ie a mixture of NS and R terms). Is it the case that M theory is a purely bosonic theory which then turns into a fermionic one when you reduce to 10 dimensions?
Thanks for any help :)