Solution

ID: past-exam-of-the-mathematics-course-of-the-university-of-cambridge/2025/iii/paper-306/1/a/solution

Varying the Polyakov action with respect to the worldsheet metric gives
In conformal gauge, variation of gives the wave equation
while the Virasoro constraints become and . The boundary variation is at each endpoint. It vanishes through a Neumann boundary condition , a Dirichlet boundary condition , or a direction-by-direction mixture of the two.

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