String models with lower critical dimension, compactification and nonabelian symmetries

Abstract

We discuss certain aspects of dimensional compactification in bosonic string models which might be generalized to the superstring case. In dual models of the Bardakci-Halpern type the critical dimension can be lowered in the presence of nonabelian symmetries. The same relation between critical dimension of Minkowski space and the rank of the nonabelian gauge group appears in the Veneziano model with some dimensions compactified on the group manifold. In ten dimensions one of the solutions is O(32).