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We start by briefly reviewing the description of gravity theories as gauge theories in four dimensions. More specifically we recall the procedure leading to the results of General Relativity and Weyl Gravity in a gauge-theoretic manner.…
The theory of cosmological perturbations is the main tool which connects theories of the early universe (based on new fundamental physics such as string theory) with cosmological observations. In these lectures, I will provide an…
This paper tentatively conjectures a possible physical picture that may help explain links between quantum field theories and string theories. A correspondence might occur if the stringy parameters $\tau $ and $\sigma_i $ are interpreted as…
I review some of the contributions which lattice simulations are likely to make during the next five years or so to the development of our understanding of particle physics. Particular emphasis is given to the evaluation of non-perturbative…
The confrontation between Einstein's gravitation theory and experimental results, notably binary pulsar data, is summarized and its significance discussed. Experiment and theory agree at the 10^{-3} level. All the basic structures of…
We give an overview of moduli stabilization in compactifications of string theory. We summarize current methods for construction and analysis of vacua with stabilized moduli, and we describe applications to cosmology and particle physics.…
The dynamical system approach has recently acquired great importance in the investigation on higher order theories of gravity. In this talk I review the main results and I give brief comments on the perspectives for further developments.
The talk contains a brief introduction string theory, followed by a discussion of some of the recent developments.
Recent developments in string theory have important implications for cosmology. Topics discussed here are inflation, the cosmological constant, smoothing of cosmological singularities, and dark matter from parallel universes. Talk presented…
This is a pedagogical introduction to the treatment of quantum general relativity as an effective field theory. It starts with an overview of the methods of effective field theory and includes an explicit example. Quantum general relativity…
String cosmology aims at providing a reliable description of the very early Universe in the regime where standard-model physics is no longer appropriate, and where we can safely apply the basic ingredients of superstring models such as…
This is an invited survey article on higher gauge theory for the Encyclopedia of Mathematical Physics, 2nd edition. In particular, we provide a lightning introduction to higher structures and to the construction of the kinematical data of…
I give a brief non-technical review of "Quantum Gravity Phenomenology" and in particular I describe some studies which should soon allow to establish valuable data-based constraints on the short-distance structure of spacetime.
This set of lecture notes first gives an introduction to the geometry of principal bundles. Next, it demonstrates how they can be used to formalize the concept of gauge theories arising in physics. A basic familiarity with the differential…
In these notes, based on a talk given at the Rencontres de Moriond, I give a simple introduction to the tremendous progress that has been made during the last few years towards the understanding of strong-coupling phenomena in quantum gauge…
The behaviour of matrix string theory in the background of a type IIA pp wave at small string coupling, g_s << 1, is determined by the combination M g_s where M is a dimensionless parameter proportional to the strength of the Ramond-Ramond…
String theory implies a relatively modest growth in computational complexity for perturbative gravity calculations as compared to gauge theory calculations, contrary to field theory expectations. An explicit string-based calculation, which…
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…
Quantum gravity--the marriage of quantum physics with general relativity--is bound to contain deep and important lessons for the nature of physical time. Some of these lessons shall be canvassed here, particularly as they arise from quantum…
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…