Related papers: Lectures on W-Gravity, W-Geometry and \W-Strings
This is a talk given by S.D. at the the workshop on Random Surfaces and 2D Quantum Gravity, Barcelona 10-14 June 1991. It is an updated review of recent work done by the authors on a proposal for non-perturbatively stable 2D quantum gravity…
These lectures, given at the 1992 Trieste Spring School, are devoted to some selected topics in N=2 \sm s on Calabi-Yau manifolds and the associated N=2 superconformal field theories. The first lecture is devoted to the ``special geometry"…
I discuss the early developments of string theory with respect to its connection with gauge theory and general relativity from my own perspective. The period covered is mainly from 1969 to 1974, during which I became involved in research on…
I present a selection of conceptual and mathematical problems in the foundations of modern physics as they derive from the title question. Contribution to a panel session, "Springer Forum: Quantum Structures -- Physical, Mathematical and…
This pre-print contains the abstracts of seminars (including key references) presented at the ESI workshop on mathematical problems in quantum gravity held during July and August of 1996. Contributors include A. Ashtekar, J. Baez, F.…
This contribution is based on a talk given by the author at the "Dualities and Generalized Geometries" session of the Corfu Summer Institute 2018 workshops. We overview the results of [1], focusing our attention on integrable…
Contributions from the G1 Working Group at the APS Summer Study on Particle and Nuclear Astrophysics and Cosmology in the Next Millennium, Snowmass, Colorado, June 29 - July 14, 1994. V. Frolov and L. Thorlacius: Quantum Aspects of Gravity.…
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…
In these lecture notes, I review the ``linear sigma model" approach to (0,2) string vacua. My aim is to provide the reader with a toolkit for studying a very broad class of (0,2) superconformal field theories with the requisite properties…
Noncommutative geometry, in its many incarnations, appears at the crossroad of various researches in theoretical and mathematical physics: from models of quantum space-time (with or without breaking of Lorentz symmetry) to loop gravity and…
Lectures on self-gravitating black holes and monopoles given at a Summer School in Lisbon in 1990 which contain material still of relevance.
A discursive, non-technical, analysis is made of some of the basic issues that arise in almost any approach to quantum gravity, and of how these issues stand in relation to recent developments in the field. Specific topics include the…
I review some recent progress in String/M-theory
These proceedings are based on lectures delivered at the "RTN Winter School on Strings, Supergravity and Gauge Theories", CERN, January 16 - January 20, 2006. The school was mainly aimed at Ph.D. students and young postdocs. The lectures…
This paper describes my talk given to the 27th Johns Hopkins Workshop: Symmetries and Mysteries of M Theory, G\"oteborg, Sweden, 24-26 August, 2003. After a brief introduction to the lightcone worldsheet formalism for summing the planar…
I hesitated for a long time before giving shape to these notes, originally intended for preliminary reading by the attendees to the Summer School "New paths towards quantum gravity" (Holbaek Bay, Denmark, May 2008). At the end, I decide…
String theory provides the only consistent framework so far that unifies all interactions including gravity. We discuss gravity and cosmology in string theory. Conventional notions from general relativity like geometry, topology etc. are…
These are course notes I wrote for my Fall 2013 graduate topics course on geometric structures, taught at ICERM. The notes rework many of proofs in William P. Thurston's beautiful but hard-to-understand paper, "Shapes of Polyhedra". A…
Talk given at the 7th Marcel Grossmann Meeting on General Relativity, Stanford University, July 24-30, 1994.
What is quantum geometry? This question is becoming a popular leitmotiv in theoretical physics and in mathematics. Conformal field theory may catch a glimpse of the right answer. We review global aspects of the geometry of conformal fields,…