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This book provides an introduction to string field theory (SFT). String theory is usually formulated in the worldsheet formalism, which describes a single string (first-quantization). While this approach is intuitive and could be pushed far…
In these lectures we give a brief introduction to perturbative and non-perturbative string theory. The outline is the following: 1. Introduction to perturbative string theory 1.1 From point particle to extended objects 1.2 Free closed and…
Bosonic string theory with the possibility for an arbitrary number of strings - i.e. a string field theory - is formulated by a Hilbert space (a Fock space), which is just that for massless noninteracting scalars. We earlier presented this…
We give a lightning introduction to critical string theory, including the 26-dimensional bosonic string, the 10-dimensional superstrings and heterotic strings with and without spacetime supersymmetry. We also discuss open strings and…
We continue work on the connection between world sheet representation of the planar phi^3 theory and string formation. The present article, like the earlier work, is based on the existence of a solitonic solution on the world sheet, and on…
String theory avoids the ultraviolet infinities that arise in trying to quantize gravity. It is also more predictive than conventional quantum field theory, one aspect of this being the way that it contributed to the emergence of the…
In the 1950's Wigner and collaborators provided an explanation for the spectrum of hadronic excitations in terms of Random Matrix Theory. In the 1980's it was understood that some hadronic spectral properties were generic to systems whose…
Intrinsic and extrinsic geometric properties of string world sheets in curved space-time background are explored. In our formulation, the only dynamical degrees of freedom of the string are its immersion coordinates. Classical equation of…
An interesting connection between the Regge theory of scattering, the Veneziano amplitude, the Lee-Yang theorems in statistical mechanics and nonextensive Renyi entropy is addressed. In this scheme the standard entropy and the Renyi entropy…
Even at tree level, the first quantized string theory suffers from apparent short distance singularities associated with collision of vertex operators that prevent us from straightforward numerical computation of various quantities.…
This is the written version of a set of introductory lectures on string theory.
We consider some questions of naturalness which arise when one considers conventional field theories in the presence of gravitation: the problem of global symmetries, the strong CP problem, and the cosmological constant problem. Using…
The String Uncertainty Relations have been known for some time as the stringy corrections to the original Heisenberg's Uncertainty principle. In this letter the Stringy Uncertainty relations, and corrections thereof, are explicitly derived…
Lenny Susskind has made many important contributions to theoretical physics during the past 35 years. In this talk I will discuss the early history of string theory (1968-72) emphasizing Susskind's contributions.
These notes are based on lectures given by Michael Green during Part III of the Mathematics Tripos (the Certificate for Advanced Study in Mathematics) in the Spring of 2003. The course provided an introduction to string theory, focussing on…
Over the last few years, string theory has changed profoundly. Most importantly, novel duality relations have emerged which involve gauge theories of brane excitations on one side and various closed string backgrounds on the other. In this…
The Feynman $i\varepsilon$ is an important ingredient in defining perturbative scattering amplitudes in field theory. Here we describe its analog in string theory. Roughly one takes the string worldsheet to have Lorentz signature when a…
This is a short account, based on a talk given at the 2024 Moriond Cosmology Conference, of where and why string theory matters in early universe cosmology. It is written for a cosmology audience predisposed to be at best sceptical, and at…
This is a broad-brush review of how string theory addresses several important questions of gravitational physics. The problem of non-renormalizability is first reviewed, followed by introduction of string theory as an ultraviolet-finite…
We reinterpret N=(2,1) strings as describing the continuum limit of matrix theory with all spatial dimensions compactified. Thus they may characterize the full set of degrees of freedom needed to formulate the theory.