An Off-Shell Superspace Reformulation of D = 4, N = 4 Super-Yang–Mills Theory

Journal article, 2018

D = 4, N = 4 super-Yang–Mills theory has an off-shell superspace formulation in terms of pure spinor superfields, which is directly inherited from the D = 10 theory. That superspace, in particular the choice of pure spinor variables, is less suitable for dealing with fields that are inherently 4-dimensional, such as the superfields based on the scalars, which are gauge-covariant, and traces of powers of scalars, which are gauge-invariant. We give a reformulation of D = 4, N = 4 super-Yang–Mills theory in N = 4 superspace, using inherently 4-dimensional pure spinors. All local degrees of freedom reside in a superfield based on the physical scalars. The formalism should be suited for calculations of correlators of traces of scalar superfields.