The Roots and Fruits of String Theory
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David Olive: His Life and Work
David Olive his life and work Edward Corrigan Department of Mathematics, University of York, YO10 5DD, UK Peter Goddard Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, NJ 08540, USA St John's College, Cambridge, CB2 1TP, UK Abstract David Olive, who died in Barton, Cambridgeshire, on 7 November 2012, aged 75, was a theoretical physicist who made seminal contributions to the development of string theory and to our understanding of the structure of quantum field theory. In early work on S-matrix theory, he helped to provide the conceptual framework within which string theory was initially formulated. His work, with Gliozzi and Scherk, on supersymmetry in string theory made possible the whole idea of superstrings, now understood as the natural framework for string theory. Olive's pioneering insights about the duality between electric and magnetic objects in gauge theories were way ahead of their time; it took two decades before his bold and courageous duality conjectures began to be understood. Although somewhat quiet and reserved, he took delight in the company of others, generously sharing his emerging understanding of new ideas with students and colleagues. He was widely influential, not only through the depth and vision of his original work, but also because the clarity, simplicity and elegance of his expositions of new and difficult ideas and theories provided routes into emerging areas of research, both for students and for the theoretical physics community more generally. arXiv:2009.05849v1 [physics.hist-ph] 12 Sep 2020 [A version of section I Biography is to be published in the Biographical Memoirs of Fellows of the Royal Society.] I Biography Childhood David Olive was born on 16 April, 1937, somewhat prematurely, in a nursing home in Staines, near the family home in Scotts Avenue, Sunbury-on-Thames, Surrey. -
The Center for Theoretical Physics: the First 50 Years
CTP50 The Center for Theoretical Physics: The First 50 Years Saturday, March 24, 2018 50 SPEAKERS Andrew Childs, Co-Director of the Joint Center for Quantum Information and Computer CTPScience and Professor of Computer Science, University of Maryland Will Detmold, Associate Professor of Physics, Center for Theoretical Physics Henriette Elvang, Professor of Physics, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor Alan Guth, Victor Weisskopf Professor of Physics, Center for Theoretical Physics Daniel Harlow, Assistant Professor of Physics, Center for Theoretical Physics Aram Harrow, Associate Professor of Physics, Center for Theoretical Physics David Kaiser, Germeshausen Professor of the History of Science and Professor of Physics Chung-Pei Ma, J. C. Webb Professor of Astronomy and Physics, University of California, Berkeley Lisa Randall, Frank B. Baird, Jr. Professor of Science, Harvard University Sanjay Reddy, Professor of Physics, Institute for Nuclear Theory, University of Washington Tracy Slatyer, Jerrold Zacharias CD Assistant Professor of Physics, Center for Theoretical Physics Dam Son, University Professor, University of Chicago Jesse Thaler, Associate Professor, Center for Theoretical Physics David Tong, Professor of Theoretical Physics, University of Cambridge, England and Trinity College Fellow Frank Wilczek, Herman Feshbach Professor of Physics, Center for Theoretical Physics and 2004 Nobel Laureate The Center for Theoretical Physics: The First 50 Years 3 50 SCHEDULE 9:00 Introductions and Welcomes: Michael Sipser, Dean of Science; CTP Peter -
Curriculum Vitae
CURRICULUM VITAE Raman Sundrum July 26, 2019 CONTACT INFORMATION Physical Sciences Complex, University of Maryland, College Park, MD 20742 Office - (301) 405-6012 Email: [email protected] CAREER John S. Toll Chair, Director of the Maryland Center for Fundamental Physics, 2012 - present. Distinguished University Professor, University of Maryland, 2011-present. Elkins Chair, Professor of Physics, University of Maryland, 2010-2012. Alumni Centennial Chair, Johns Hopkins University, 2006- 2010. Full Professor at the Department of Physics and Astronomy, The Johns Hopkins University, 2001- 2010. Associate Professor at the Department of Physics and Astronomy, The Johns Hop- kins University, 2000- 2001. Research Associate at the Department of Physics, Stanford University, 1999- 2000. Advisor { Prof. Savas Dimopoulos. 1 Postdoctoral Fellow at the Department of Physics, Boston University. 1996- 1999. Postdoc advisor { Prof. Sekhar Chivukula. Postdoctoral Fellow in Theoretical Physics at Harvard University, 1993-1996. Post- doc advisor { Prof. Howard Georgi. Postdoctoral Fellow in Theoretical Physics at the University of California at Berke- ley, 1990-1993. Postdoc advisor { Prof. Stanley Mandelstam. EDUCATION Yale University, New-Haven, Connecticut Ph.D. in Elementary Particle Theory, May 1990 Thesis Title: `Theoretical and Phenomenological Aspects of Effective Gauge Theo- ries' Thesis advisor: Prof. Lawrence Krauss Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island Participant in the 1988 Theoretical Advanced Summer Institute University of Sydney, Australia B.Sc with First Class Honours in Mathematics and Physics, Dec. 1984 AWARDS, DISTINCTIONS J. J. Sakurai Prize in Theoretical Particle Physics, American Physical Society, 2019. Distinguished Visiting Research Chair, Perimeter Institute, 2012 - present. 2 Moore Fellow, Cal Tech, 2015. American Association for the Advancement of Science, Fellow, 2011. -
Stanley Mandelstam
I knew very early of Stanley Mandelstam I started physics as a t Prisoner of the s u Mandelstam Triangle I escaped from the Mandelstam Triangle only to be ensnared in Light-Cone Superspace A Note of Personal Gratitude 1971 NAL Visit SuperConformal Theories P. Ramond (with S. Ananth, D. Belyaev, L. Brink and S.-S. Kim) Light-Cone Superspaces N=4 Super Yang-Mills N=8 SuperConformal N=8 SuperGravity and E7(7) N=16 SuperGravity and E8(8) N=8 Light-Cone Superspace houses D=11: N=1 SuperGravity SO(9); F4/SO(9) D=4: N=8 SuperGravity SO(2)x E7(7) D=3: N=16 SuperGravity E8(8) D=2: N=16 Theory E9(9) N=4 Light-Cone Superspace habitat for D=10: N=1 Super Yang-Mills SO(8) D=4: N=4 Super Yang-Mills PSU(2,2|4) D=3: N=8 Super Conformal OSp(2,2|8) 1 i 1 ϕ (y) = 1 A (y) + i θm θn C (y) + 1θm θn θp θq $ ∂+ A¯ (y) + m n mn m n p mnpqq + ¯ ϕ (y) = +∂A (y) + √2θ θ Cmn (y) +12 θ θ θ θ $mnpq ∂ A (y) ∂ √2 √ 12 1 i 1 i m 2 m n p q m n m n p q + i+ +¯ θ χ¯m(y) + √2θ θ θ $mnpq χ (y) ϕ (y) = + A (y) + θ θ Cmn (y) + θ θ θ θ $mnpq ∂ ∂Am(y) 6 m n p q ∂ √2 12 + θ χ¯m(y) + θ θ θ $mnpq χ (y) 1 i m n 1 m n p ∂q+ + ¯ 6 ϕ (y) = A (y) + √θ θ C L(C2y) + Fθorθ maθ θ $lmnpqism∂ A (y) ∂+i m √ 2 m nmnp q12 + θ χ¯m(y) +2 θ θ θ $mnpq χ (y) 1 0 3 ∂+ 6 x± = (x x ) i √2 √ m m n p q 12 0± 3 + + θ χ¯m(y) + θ θ θ $mnpq χ (y) x± = (x x ) ∂ 6 √2 ± Light-Cone Co1ordina0 3tes: 1 0 3 x± = (x x ) ∂± = ( ∂ ∂ ) √2 ± √2 − ± 1 0 3 1 0 3 x± = (x x ) ∂± = ( ∂ ∂ ) 1 0√ 3 ± 1 1 2√2 − ±1 1 2 ∂± = ( ∂ 2∂ ) x = (x + ix ) x = (x ix ) √2 − ± √2 √2 − m m + 1 1 2 1 1 2 1 q+ , q¯+ n =1 i√2δ n ∂ x = 1(x + ix -
Julian Schwinger: Nuclear Physics, the Radiation Laboratory, Renormalized QED, Source Theory, and Beyond
Julian Schwinger: Nuclear Physics, the Radiation Laboratory, Renormalized QED, Source Theory, and Beyond Kimball A. Milton∗ Homer L. Dodge Department of Physics and Astronomy University of Oklahoma, Norman, OK 73019 USA October 9, 2006 Abstract Julian Schwinger’s influence on twentieth century science is pro- found and pervasive. Of course, he is most famous for his renormal- ization theory of quantum electrodynamics, for which he shared the Nobel Prize with Richard Feynman and Sin-itiro Tomonaga. But al- though this triumph was undoubtedly his most heroic work, his legacy lives on chiefly through subtle and elegant work in classical electrody- namics, quantum variational principles, proper-time methods, quan- tum anomalies, dynamical mass generation, partial symmetry, and more. Starting as just a boy, he rapidly became the pre-eminent nu- clear physicist in the late 1930s, led the theoretical development of radar technology at MIT during World War II, and then, soon after the war, conquered quantum electrodynamics, and became the leading quantum field theorist for two decades, before taking a more icono- clastic route during his last quarter century. Keywords: Julian Schwinger, nuclear physics, waveguides, quan- tum electrodynamics, renormalization, quantum action principle, source theory, axial-vector anomaly ∗K.A. Milton is Professor of Physics at the University of Oklahoma. He was a Ph.D. stu- dent of Julian Schwinger from 1968–71, and his postdoc at UCLA for the rest of the 1970s. He has written a scientific biography of Schwinger, edited two volumes of Schwinger’s se- lected works, and co-authored two textbooks based on Schwinger’s lectures. -
STRING THEORY in the TWENTIETH CENTURY John H
STRING THEORY IN THE TWENTIETH CENTURY John H. Schwarz Strings 2016 { August 1, 2016 ABSTRACT String theory has been described as 21st century sci- ence, which was discovered in the 20th century. Most of you are too young to have experienced what happened. Therefore, I think it makes sense to summarize some of the highlights in this opening lecture. Since I only have 25 minutes, this cannot be a com- prehensive history. Important omitted topics include 2d CFT, string field theory, topological string theory, string phenomenology, and contributions to pure mathematics. Even so, I probably have too many slides. 1 1960 { 68: The analytic S matrix The goal was to construct the S matrix that describes hadronic scattering amplitudes by assuming • Unitarity and analyticity of the S matrix • Analyticity in angular momentum and Regge Pole The- ory • The bootstrap conjecture, which developed into Dual- ity (e.g., between s-channel and t-channel resonances) 2 The dual resonance model In 1968 Veneziano found an explicit realization of duality and Regge behavior in the narrow resonance approxima- tion: Γ(−α(s))Γ(−α(t)) A(s; t) = g2 ; Γ(−α(s) − α(t)) 0 α(s) = α(0) + α s: The motivation was phenomenological. Incredibly, this turned out to be a tree amplitude in a string theory! 3 Soon thereafter Virasoro proposed, as an alternative, g2 Γ(−α(s))Γ(−α(t))Γ(−α(u)) T = 2 2 2 ; −α(t)+α(u) −α(s)+α(u) −α(s)+α(t) Γ( 2 )Γ( 2 )Γ( 2 ) which has similar virtues. -
The Influence of Stanley Mandelstam
The Influence of Stanley Mandelstam Michael B. Green Department of Applied Mathematics and Theoretical Physics Wilberforce Road, Cambridge CB3 0WA, UK School of Physics and Astronomy Queen Mary University of London, Mile End road, London E1 4NS, UK I hardly knew Stanley Mandelstam - our paths rarely crossed, and when they did our discussions were restricted to technical, rather than personal, issues. It is, however, an honour to be asked to write this short memoir since his work was hugely innovative and he was one of the pioneers who laid the foundations for much of the subject of my research. My interests as a PhD student in Cambridge in the late 1960's were strongly influenced by the ideas of S-matrix theory that had emerged from Berkeley, largely following the work of Chew, and Mandelstam. Stanley made use of his exceptional understanding of the analytic properties of perturbative quantum field theory to motivate a more rigorous approach to S- matrix theory. This led him to the covariant formulation of scattering amplitudes in terms of \Mandelstam variables" and to the \Mandelstam representation", which provided an elegant framework for discussing dispersion relations. He was one of the early contributors to Regge pole theory and its relation to sums of Feynman diagrams. These were the basic ingredients for much of the S-matrix programme that attempted to explain the strong interactions in the absence of a quantum field theory description. Stanley was prominent in the series of developments relating to the strong interactions that grew out of the S-matrix programme and were taking place during my period as a graduate student. -
Physics and Mathematics : a Happily Evolving Marriage ?
PUBLICATIONS MATHÉMATIQUES DE L’I.H.É.S. GABRIELE VENEZIANO Physics and mathematics : a happily evolving marriage ? Publications mathématiques de l’I.H.É.S., tome S88 (1998), p. 183-189 <http://www.numdam.org/item?id=PMIHES_1998__S88__183_0> © Publications mathématiques de l’I.H.É.S., 1998, tous droits réservés. L’accès aux archives de la revue « Publications mathématiques de l’I.H.É.S. » (http:// www.ihes.fr/IHES/Publications/Publications.html) implique l’accord avec les conditions géné- rales d’utilisation (http://www.numdam.org/conditions). Toute utilisation commerciale ou im- pression systématique est constitutive d’une infraction pénale. Toute copie ou impression de ce fichier doit contenir la présente mention de copyright. Article numérisé dans le cadre du programme Numérisation de documents anciens mathématiques http://www.numdam.org/ PHYSICS AND MATHEMATICS: A HAPPILY EVOLVING MARRIAGE? by GABRIELE VENEZIANO Abstract. - The interplay of physics and mathematics started affecting my student life some forty years ago, and has remained a personal struggle since. 1. High School Days Forty years ago, when the IHÉS was created, I was in my third year as a high school student in Florence. 1 was doing well in most subjects, typically through hard work, and, with almost no effort, 1 was doing particularly well in maths and physics. These two subjects were taught, in Italian high schools, by the same Professor. Very luckily, my class had been assigned to an excellent teacher whose name 1 still remember: Prof. Liverani. 1 recall very well how he gave me the feeling he loved those two subjects and how he could transmit this love to (some of) us. -
The Birth of String Theory
THE BIRTH OF STRING THEORY String theory is currently the best candidate for a unified theory of all forces and all forms of matter in nature. As such, it has become a focal point for physical and philosophical dis- cussions. This unique book explores the history of the theory’s early stages of development, as told by its main protagonists. The book journeys from the first version of the theory (the so-called Dual Resonance Model) in the late 1960s, as an attempt to describe the physics of strong interactions outside the framework of quantum field theory, to its reinterpretation around the mid-1970s as a quantum theory of gravity unified with the other forces, and its successive developments up to the superstring revolution in 1984. Providing important background information to current debates on the theory, this book is essential reading for students and researchers in physics, as well as for historians and philosophers of science. andrea cappelli is a Director of Research at the Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare, Florence. His research in theoretical physics deals with exact solutions of quantum field theory in low dimensions and their application to condensed matter and statistical physics. elena castellani is an Associate Professor at the Department of Philosophy, Uni- versity of Florence. Her research work has focussed on such issues as symmetry, physical objects, reductionism and emergence, structuralism and realism. filippo colomo is a Researcher at the Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare, Florence. His research interests lie in integrable models in statistical mechanics and quantum field theory. paolo di vecchia is a Professor of Theoretical Physics at Nordita, Stockholm, and at the Niels Bohr Institute, Copenhagen. -
The Birth of String Theory
The Birth of String Theory Edited by Andrea Cappelli INFN, Florence Elena Castellani Department of Philosophy, University of Florence Filippo Colomo INFN, Florence Paolo Di Vecchia The Niels Bohr Institute, Copenhagen and Nordita, Stockholm Contents Contributors page vii Preface xi Contents of Editors' Chapters xiv Abbreviations and acronyms xviii Photographs of contributors xxi Part I Overview 1 1 Introduction and synopsis 3 2 Rise and fall of the hadronic string Gabriele Veneziano 19 3 Gravity, unification, and the superstring John H. Schwarz 41 4 Early string theory as a challenging case study for philo- sophers Elena Castellani 71 EARLY STRING THEORY 91 Part II The prehistory: the analytic S-matrix 93 5 Introduction to Part II 95 6 Particle theory in the Sixties: from current algebra to the Veneziano amplitude Marco Ademollo 115 7 The path to the Veneziano model Hector R. Rubinstein 134 iii iv Contents 8 Two-component duality and strings Peter G.O. Freund 141 9 Note on the prehistory of string theory Murray Gell-Mann 148 Part III The Dual Resonance Model 151 10 Introduction to Part III 153 11 From the S-matrix to string theory Paolo Di Vecchia 178 12 Reminiscence on the birth of string theory Joel A. Shapiro 204 13 Personal recollections Daniele Amati 219 14 Early string theory at Fermilab and Rutgers Louis Clavelli 221 15 Dual amplitudes in higher dimensions: a personal view Claud Lovelace 227 16 Personal recollections on dual models Renato Musto 232 17 Remembering the `supergroup' collaboration Francesco Nicodemi 239 18 The `3-Reggeon vertex' Stefano Sciuto 246 Part IV The string 251 19 Introduction to Part IV 253 20 From dual models to relativistic strings Peter Goddard 270 21 The first string theory: personal recollections Leonard Susskind 301 22 The string picture of the Veneziano model Holger B. -
Pos(HRMS)078 ∗ [email protected] Speaker
Two unforgettable years with Hector PoS(HRMS)078 Gabriele Veneziano∗ Collège de France, Paris, France and Theory Division, CERN, CH-1211 Geneva 23, Switzerland E-mail: [email protected] .......................... ........................... Quarks, Strings and the Cosmos - Hector Rubinstein Memorial Symposium August 09-11, 2010 AlbaNova (Stockholm) Sweden ∗Speaker. c Copyright owned by the author(s) under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike Licence. http://pos.sissa.it/ Two unforgettable years Gabriele Veneziano 1. Another lucky coincidence As a high school student in Florence I had the luck of being taught by some excellent teachers: Professor Tebaldo Liverani, in particular, was the one who initiated me to loving maths and physics. His preference, he once confessed, went to the former. However, after some hesitation, mine went to the latter as I entered the local University in 1960. Three years later I had to make another choice, this time about which branch of physics to go for. I was about to be "recruited" by the local high-energy experimental group when, just in time, Professor Raoul Gatto moved from Cagliari to Florence and "rescued" me to theoretical physics. PoS(HRMS)078 At the end of 1965 I received my "Laurea" in physics defending a thesis on some applications of the group SU(6)W . Only later I learned that the W in there apparently stood for Weizmann . Working in Florence as one of Gatto’s "gattini" was very stimulating. However, having always lived at home in my family in Florence, I felt the need to enlarge my horizons, both in physics and in life in general. -
Arxiv:0804.3210V1 [Hep-Ph] 20 Apr 2008 Nrdcint Tigter N Ag/Rvt Duality Gauge/Gravity and Theory String to Introduction ∗ † O Hs Tdnswihaesatn Olanqdadqpphysics View
Introduction to String Theory and Gauge/Gravity duality ∗ for students in QCD and QGP phenomenology Institut de Physique Th´eorique; URA 2306, unit´ede recherche associ´ee au CNRS, IPhT, CEA/Saclay, 91191 Gif-sur-Yvette Cedex, France Robi Peschanski † String theory has been initially derived from motivations coming from strong interaction phenomenology, but its application faced deep concep- tual and practical difficulties. The strong interactions found their the- oretical fundation elsewhere, namely on QCD, the quantum gauge field theory of quarks and gluons. Recently, the Gauge/Gravity correspondence allowed to initiate a reformulation of the connection between strings and gauge field theories, avoiding some of the initial drawbacks and opening the way to new insights on the gauge theory at strong coupling and even- tually QCD. Among others, the recent applications of the Gauge/Gravity correspondence to the formation of the QGP, the quark-gluon plasma, in heavy-ion reactions seem to provide a physically interesting insight on phe- nomenological features of the reactions. In these lectures we will give a arXiv:0804.3210v1 [hep-ph] 20 Apr 2008 simplified introduction to those aspects of string theory which, at the ori- gin and in the recent developments, are connected to strong interactions, for those students which are starting to learn QCD and QGP physics from an experimental or phenomenological point of view. PACS numbers: 11.15.-q,11.25.Tq ∗ Presented at the School on QCD, Low-x Physics and Diffraction, Copanello, Calabria, Italy, July 2007. † email:[email protected] (1) 2 proceedings printed on October 25, 2018 CONTENTS Lecture I: String Theory via Strong Interactions 1.