Related papers: The dangerous irrelevance of string theory
We discuss the main cosmological implications of considering string-loop effects and a potential for the dilaton in the lowest order string effective action. Our framework is based on the effective model arising from regarding homogeneous…
The inflationary paradigm provides a robust description of the peculiar initial conditions which are required for the success of the Hot Big Bang model of cosmology, as well as of the recent precision measurements of temperature…
In this paper we point out that the spacetime uncertainty relation proposed for string theory has strong cosmological implications that can solve the flatness problem and the horizon problem without the need of inflation. We make minimal…
The string tension does not have to be put in by hand, it can be dynamically generated, as in the case when we formulate string theory in the modified measure formalism, and other formulations as well. Then string tension appears, but as an…
The cosmic string theory for cosmological fluctuations is a good example of healthy scientific progress in cosmology. It is a well defined physically motivated model that has been tested by cosmological observations and has been ruled out…
We review some recent developments in string theory, emphasizing the importance of vacuum instabilities, their relation to the density of states, and the role of space-time fermions in non-critical string theory. We also discuss the…
I discuss cosmological models either derived from, or inspired by, string theory or M-theory. In particular I discuss solutions in the low-energy effective theory and the role of the dilaton, moduli and antisymmetric form fields in the…
After 25 years of its existence, inflationary theory gradually becomes the standard cosmological paradigm. However, we still do not know which of the many versions of inflationary cosmology will be favored by the future observational data.…
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…
In these lectures I review recent attempts to apply string theory to cosmology, including string cosmology and various models of brane cosmology. In addition, the review includes an introduction to inflation as well as a discussion of…
In the book "String Theory and the Scientific Method", Richard Dawid describes a few of the many non-empirical arguments that motivate theoretical physicists' confidence in a theory, taking string theory as case study. I argue that…
In this paper we consider inflation as a probe of new physics near the string or Planck scale. We discuss how new physics can be captured by the choice of vacuum, and how this leads to modifications of the primordial spectrum as well as the…
Predicting signatures of string theory on cosmological observables is not sufficient. Often the observable effects string theory may impact upon the cosmological arena may equally be predicted by features of inflationary physics. The…
These notes are devoted to the intriguing and still largely unexplored links between String Theory and Higher Spins, the types of excitations that lie behind its most cherished properties. A closer look at higher-spin fields provides some…
String theory is at the moment the only advanced approach to a unification of all interactions, including gravity. But, in spite of the more than thirty years of its existence, it does not make any empirically testable predictions, and it…
The aim of these lectures is to give an introduction to several topics which lie at the intersection of string theory, gravity theory and gravity phenomenology. One successively reviews: (i) the "membrane" approach to the dissipative…
These four lectures, addressed to an audience of graduate students in experimental high energy physics, survey some of the basic concepts in string theory. The purpose is to convey a general sense of what string theory is and what it has…
Aspects of string cosmology for critical and non-critical strings are discussed emphasizing the necessity to account for the dilaton dynamics for a proper incorporation of ``large - small" duality. This drastically modifies the intuition…
Inflationary cosmology has provided a predictive and phenomenologically very successful scenario for early universe cosmology. Attempts to implement inflation using scalar fields, however, lead to models with serious conceptual problems. I…
Inflation can act as a space-time microscope for Planck or string scale effects, leaving potentially observable traces in the primordial perturbation spectrum. I discuss two frameworks that were used recently to study this phenomenon:…