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Calendar

# TOPICS
1
  • Introduction.
  • Lorentz invariance, light-cone coordinates and extra dimensions.
  • Electromagnetism and gravitation in various dimensions.
  • Large extra dimensions.
2
  • Non-relativistic strings and their dynamics.
  • Action principle and Lagrangian.
  • The relativistic point particle, its action and equations of motion.
  • Charged point particle.
3
  • Relativistic strings and the Nambu-Goto action.
  • Stretched strings and the static gauge.
  • String parametrization and general solutions of the equations of motion.
4
  • Light-cone solution of the string equations of motion.
  • Light cone quantum fields and particle states.
  • The quantization of the relativistic point particle.
5
  • Quantization of relativistic open strings.
  • Transverse Virasoro operators.
  • The critical dimension.
  • The emergence of electromagnetism.
  • Tachyons and D-branes.
  • Quantization of closed strings.
  • The emergence of gravity in string theory.
6
  • D-branes of various dimensionalities, quantization of open strings stretched between D-branes.
  • String charge and Kalb-Ramond fields.
7
  • T-duality of closed strings.
  • T-duality of open strings.
  • Wilson lines.
8
  • String thermodynamics, Hagedorn temperature and black hole entropy.
  • D-branes with electric or magnetic fields.
  • Born-Infeld electrodynamics.
9
  • String interactions and Riemann surfaces.
  • The moduli space of the torus.
  • Finiteness.
  • A survey of fermionic string theories.