On the normalization and hermiticity of amplitudes in 4D heterotic superstrings

Abstract

We consider how to normalize the scattering amplitudes of 4D heterotic superstrings in a Minkowski background. We fix the normalization of the vacuum amplitude (the string partition function) at each genus, and of every vertex operator describing a physical external string state in a way consistent with unitarity of the S-matrix. We also provide an explicit expression for the map relating the vertex operator of an incoming physical state to the vertex operator describing the same physical state, but outgoing. This map is related to hermitian conjugation and to the hermiticity properties of the scattering amplitudes.