Related papers: A critical look at strings
Recent years have seen noteworthy progress in the mathematical formulation of quantum field theory and perturbative string theory. We give a brief survey of these developments. It serves as an introduction to the more detailed collection…
A brief discussion is presented assessing the achievements and challenges of string phenomenology: the subfield dedicated to study the potential for string theory to make contact with particle physics and cosmology. Building from the well…
This Resource Letter provides a guide to some of the the introductory and review literature in string theory. It is in no way complete, though it is intended to be of use to students at several levels. Owing to the nature of the subject,…
We comment on the relation between string theory and empirical science, grounding our discussion in cosmology, a subject with increasingly precise data in which this connection operates at several levels. It is important to take into…
In this article, prepared for the book "The birth of string theory", I recall the sequence of ideas which led to non-critical strings and gauge/strings duality. I also comment on some promising future directions.
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…
A brief review of the status of duality symmetries in string theory is presented. The evidence is accumulating rapidly that an enormous group of duality symmetries, including perturbative T dualities and non-perturbative S-dualities,…
In this short talk we review basic ideas of string field theory with the emphasis on the recent developments. We show how without too much technicality one can look for analytic solutions to Witten's open string field theory. This is an…
Much of the recent progress in String Theory can be traced to a precise strategy: a careful study of the few models known since the beginnings of the subject, and the abstraction from them of basic properties that one would like to demand…
String Theory is a hot topic of physics and mathematics. For the former, it stands as a huge sandbox where the formulation of difficult problems can be simplified and their hard computations carried out. For the latter, it stands as a…
String theory is a quantum theory that reproduces the results of General Relativity at long distances but is completely different at short distances. Mathematically, string theory is based on a very new -- and little understood -- framework…
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…
Some problems in finding a complete quantum theory incorporating gravity are discussed. One is that of giving a consistent unitary description of high-energy scattering. Another is that of giving a consistent quantum description of…
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…
Searching for space/time noncommutativity we reconsider open strings in a constant background electric field. The main difference between this situation and its magnetic counterpart is that here there is a critical electric field beyond…
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.
These lectures present a general critical assessment of various frameworks for quantum gravity, with particular emphasis on string theory. The topics discussed cover field-theoretical approaches to quantum gravity, anomalies, bosonic and…
I briefly review several important formal theory developments in quantum field theory and string theory that were reported at ICHEP conferences in past decades, and explain how they underlie a new research area referred to as physical or…
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…
String theory developed by demanding consistency with quantum mechanics. In this paper we wish to reverse the reasoning. We pretend open string field theory is a fully consistent definition of the theory - it is at least a self consistent…