THE HAGEDORN TRANSITION AND THE MATRIX MODEL FOR STRINGS

Abstract

We use the matrix formalism to investigate what happens to strings above the Hagedorn temperature. We show that is not a limiting temperature but a temperature at which the continuum string picture breaks down. We study a collection of N D-0-branes arranged to form a string having N units of light-cone momentum. We find that at high temperatures the favored phase is one where the string worldsheet has disappeared and the low-energy degrees of freedom consists of N2 massless particles ("gluons"). The nature of the transition is very similar to the deconfinement transition in large-N Yang–Mills theories.