Related papers: From Quarks to Strings
These lectures trace the origin of string theory as a theory of hadronic interactions (predating QCD itself) to the present ideas on how the QCD string may arise in Superstring theory in a suitably deformed background metric. The…
The search for a theory of quantum gravity faces two great challenges: the incredibly small scales of the Planck length and time, and the possibility that the observed constants of nature are in part the result of random processes. A…
This article is based on a talk given at the ``Strings'97'' conference. It discusses the search for the universality class of confining strings. The key ingredients include the loop equations, the zigzag symmetry, the non-linear…
After briefly reviewing basic concepts of perturbative string theory, we explain in simple terms some of the new findings that created excitement among the string physicists. These developments include non-perturbative dualities and a…
This article provides some historical background and then reviews developments in string theory over the last twenty-five years or so. Both perturbative and non-perturbative approaches to string theory are surveyed and their impact on how…
The aim of these notes is to give recent developments in string theory. In particular, we discuss the string spectrums, compactifications, brane physics and dualities.
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…
These are my personal impressions of the environment in which string theory was born, and what the important developments affecting my work were during the hadronic string era, 1968-1974. I discuss my motivations and concerns at the time,…
The duality map between gauge theories and strings suggests that when the gauge theory is in the weak coupling regime the dual string tension effectively tends to zero, $\alpha' \to \infty$. This observation of Sundborg and Witten initiates…
We survey recent progress in understanding the relation of string theory to quantum chromodynamics, focusing on holographic models of gauge theories similar to QCD and applications to heavy-ion collisions.
In this paper we make further refinements to the duality proposed between N=1 SQCD and certain string (supergravity plus branes) backgrounds, working in the regime of comparable large number of colors and flavors. Using the string theory…
String theory has been initially derived from motivations coming from strong interaction phenomenology,but its application faced deep conceptual and practical difficulties. The strong interactions found their theoretical foundation…
The early history of string theory is marked by a shift from strong interaction physics to quantum gravity. The first string models and associated theoretical framework were formulated in the late 1960s and early 1970s in the context of the…
Duality, the equivalence between seemingly distinct quantum systems, is a curious property that has been known for at least three quarters of a century. In the past two decades it has played a central role in mapping out the structure of…
There have been many remarkable developments in our understanding of superstring theory in the past few years, a period that has been described as ``the second superstring revolution.'' Several of them are discussed here. The presentation…
The purpose of this short review is to present progresses in string theory in the recent past. There have been very important developments in our understanding of string dynamics, especially in the nonperturbative aspects. In this context,…
This is an invited contribution to the Special Issue of "Foundations of Physics" titled "Forty Years Of String Theory: Reflecting On the Foundations". I have been asked to assess string theory as an outsider, and to compare it with the…
In this article I first give an abbreviated history of string theory and then describe the recently-conjectured field-string duality. This suggests a class of nonsupersymmetric gauge theories which are conformal (CGT) to leading order of…
After a review of some topics concerning the phenomenological applications of perturbative string theory, I discuss to what extent all of it is affected by the recent developements in string dualities.
An overview of some of the developments in string theory over the past two years is given, focusing on four topics: realistic (standard model like) models from string theory, geometric engineering and theories with fluxes, the gauge…