1999/03/31 by Joseph Kouneiher, Kouneiher, Joseph
Mathematics · Physics and Astronomy · #Black Holes and Theoretical Physics #FOS: Physical sciences #Geometric and Algebraic Topology #High Energy Physics - Theory (hep-th) #Noncommutative and Quantum Gravity Theories #hep-th
paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.hep-th/9903268
31 pages, 9 figures. This conference is the first part of two lectures treating the geometric principle lying behind superstring theory. It is an introductory one
openalex publication_date 1999/03/31 · arxiv created 1999/04/11 · arxiv updated 2009/11/30 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28
I describe our understanding of physics near the planck length, in particular the great progress of the last four years in string theory. Superstring theory, and a recent extension called M theory, are leading candidates for a quantum theory that unifies gravity with the other forces. As such, they are certainly not ordinary quantum field theories. However, recent duality conjectures suggest that a more complete definition of these theories can be provided by the large N limits of suitably chosen U(N) gauge theories associated to the asymptotic boundary of spacetime.