Sketching a proof of the Maldacena conjecture at small radius

Abstract

Abstract At small AdS radius, the superstring on AdS 5 × S 5 was conjectured by Maldacena to be equivalent to $$ \mathcal{N} $$ N = 4 super-Yang-Mills at small ‘t Hooft coupling where thickened Feynman diagrams can be used to compute scattering amplitudes. It was previously shown that the pure spinor worldsheet action of the AdS 5 × S 5 superstring can be expressed as the sum of a BRST-trivial term and a “B-term” which is antisymmetric in worldsheet derivatives. Using the explicit form of the pure spinor vertex operators, it will be argued here that the free super-Yang-Mills Feynman diagrams are described by the BRST-trivial term where the thickened propagators are the regions of the string worldsheet near the AdS boundary and the holes are the regions near the AdS horizon. Evidence will then be presented that the antisymmetric B-term generates the super-Yang-Mills vertex so that, at small radius and arbitrary genus, the superstring amplitudes correctly reproduce the super-Yang-Mills Feynman diagram expansion.