Constraints on tree-level higher order gravitational couplings in superstring theory.

We consider the scattering amplitudes of five and six gravitons at tree level in superstring theory. Their power series expansions in the Regge slope α' are analyzed through the order α'(8) showing some interesting constraints on higher order gravitational couplings in the effective superstring action such as the absence of R(5) terms. Furthermore, some transcendentality constraints on the coefficients of the nonvanishing couplings are observed: the absence of zeta values of even weight through the order α'(8) like the absence of ζ(2)ζ(3)R(6) terms. Our analysis is valid for any superstring background in any space-time dimension, which allows for a conformal field theory description.

Dijet signals for low mass strings at the Large Hadron Collider.

Assuming that the fundamental string mass scale is in the TeV range and the theory is weakly coupled, we discuss possible signals of string physics at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC). In D-brane constructions, the dominant contributions to full-fledged string amplitudes for all the common QCD parton subprocesses leading to dijets are completely independent of the details of compactification, and can be evaluated in a parameter-free manner. We make use of these amplitudes evaluated near the first resonant pole to determine the discovery potential of LHC for the first Regge excitations of the quark and gluon. Remarkably, the reach of LHC after a few years of running can be as high as 6.8 TeV. Even after the first 100 pb(-1) of integrated luminosity, string scales as high as 4.0 TeV can be discovered. Data on pp-->directgamma + jet can provide corroboration for string physics at scales as high as 5 TeV.

Amplitude for N-gluon superstring scattering.

We consider scattering processes involving N gluonic massless states of open superstrings with a certain Regge slope alpha'. At the semiclassical level, the string world-sheet sweeps a disk and N gluons are created or annihilated at the boundary. We present exact expressions for the corresponding amplitudes, valid to all orders in alpha', for the so-called maximally helicity violating configurations, with N = 4, 5 and N = 6. We also obtain the leading O(alpha '2) string corrections to the zero-slope N-gluon Yang-Mills amplitudes.