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## String theory today

Each year, the annual String conference provides us with a kind of snapshot of the field as it is today. The lineup of invited speakers and the titles of their talks give an idea of the current activity and interests of string researchers.

This year Strings 2012 is in Munich and starts on Monday 23 July. The organizers plan to have 45 talks. As of today titles of 16 of the 45 are listed.

F. Alday Mixed correlators in N=4 SYM
T. Dimofte Building blocks in 3d SCFT
M. Gaberdiel Minimal Model Holography
G. Horowitz Why General Relativity is like a High Temperature Superconductor
N. Iqbal Friedel oscillations and horizon charge in 1D holographic liquids
A. Karch Recent Applications of the Gauge/Gravity Correspondence to QCD and Condensed Matter Physics
S. Kortner Status and latest results of the LHC
H. Nicolai Alternative approaches to quantum gravity: a brief survey
H.P. Nilles Heterotic supersymmetry: the legacy of D=10 and N=4
S. Raju Scattering Amplitudes and AdS/CFT Correlators
J. Schwarz Opening Lecture
A. Strominger Progress in dS/CFT
A. Uranga Update on string phenomenology
E. Witten Superstring Perturbation Theory Revisited
M. Yamazaki Networks, Quivers and 3-manifolds
X. Yin Higher Spin Holography

Overall attendance figures for some past conferences. In several cases (e.g. Madrid) a cap was placed on attendance and registration was only allowed up to a certain limit:

Registered participants in the annual conference (some years omitted for brevity)
Code:
Strings 2003 Kyoto     396
Strings 2005 Toronto   415
Strings 2009 Rome      450
Strings 2011 Uppsala   265
Strings 2012 Munich    384 (prelim.)
So far 384 people have registered to attend the conference, of which roughly half are listed as "student", "graduate student", "PhD student", or "postdoc."

The state of the field is also reflected in what kinds of theorists physics departments are most interested in hiring: e.g. which particle theory specializations (cosmology, phenomenology, string, lattice...) currently figure most prominently. The particle theory job picture for this year (Usa + Canada, first-time faculty positions) is the same as it was 8 June, over a month ago. Twelve HEP theorists have offers, of whom one is a string theorist. Faculty hiring for the fall semester could still change but now seems approximately complete for the year.

Annual first time faculty hires in theoretical particle physics (Usa + Canada)
(Up through 2010, the rates are averaged over 3 years intervals.)
Code:
period          1999-2001   2002-2004   2005-2007   2008-2010  2011   2012
HEP theory hires   18         24          23          13        11     12
string hires        9          8           6           2         1      1
The source used for the preliminary 2012 estimates: http://particle.physics.ucdavis.edu/rumor/doku.php
Source for previous years: http://www.physics.utoronto.ca/~poppitz/Jobs94-08
 PhysOrg.com physics news on PhysOrg.com >> Study provides better understanding of water's freezing behavior at nanoscale>> Soft matter offers new ways to study how ordered materials arrange themselves>> Making quantum encryption practical
 Great job putting this together. Of the talks currently listed, the two that look most interesting to me are Strominger's talk on dS/CFT, and Uranga's talk on string phenomenology.
 Recognitions: Gold Member Science Advisor Thanks! I tend to agree with you. Phenomenology is the key area, a kind of information bottleneck, and any development there would be highly significant. Also Strominger (I have a high regard for him) often gives one of the more interesting talks at the annual conference. In this case the restriction to AdS has been a major handicap for something like 10 years. Given the apparent positive cosmo constant they in some sense HAVE to break out of the AdS trap. So (IMHO as nonexpert observer) everybody is going to be interested by what he presents. Here is the website's speaker list with titles posted so far: http://wwwth.mpp.mpg.de/members/stri...ram/talks.html We can check back periodically with this link to see how it shapes up as more talk titles are added. I also find it interesting that Hermann Nicolai (another of my favorite string people) is giving a survey talk on non-string QG alternatives. The organizers apparently thought this topic would interest those attending the conference.

## String theory today

I wonder if Strominger will make any mention of the result of Hawking/Hartle/Hertog. That is, the paper in which they attempted to show that a negative cosmological constant would result in a positive acceleration of expansion.

Another talk that looks interesting is the one that will be given by Kortner regarding the latest results at LHC.

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 Quote by Mark M I wonder if Strominger will make any mention of the result of Hawking/Hartle/Hertog. That is, the paper in which they attempted to show that a negative cosmological constant would result in a positive acceleration of expansion. Another talk that looks interesting is the one that will be given by Kortner regarding the latest results at LHC.
I think he almost has to make some reference to that paper---the authors are so prominent.
You're right about the Kortner talk, it's likely to be well worth watching!

I'll do an update on the conference while I'm at it. About a week to go. Registration is at 384, half are listed as grad student, postdoc and the like.
As of today titles of 24 of the 45 planned talks are listed. The strongest common theme appears to be CFT-based holography, i.e. gauge/gravity correspondence and its applications. To show thematic emphasis I've highlighted the CFT/holo talks:

M. Aganagic Knots, Mirror Symmetry and Large N Duality
F. Alday Mixed correlators in N=4 SYM
M. Cvetič Non-perturbative Effects in F-theory Compactifications
T. Dimofte Building blocks in 3d SCFT
M. Gaberdiel Minimal Model Holography
D. Gross Outlook/Vision
G. Horowitz Why General Relativity is like a High Temperature Superconductor
N. Iqbal Friedel oscillations and horizon charge in 1D holographic liquids
A. Karch Recent Applications of the Gauge/Gravity Correspondence to QCD and Condensed Matter Physics
S. Kachru New Horizons in Finite Density Field Theory and String Theory
S. Kortner Status and latest results of the LHC
H. Nicolai Alternative approaches to quantum gravity: a brief survey
H.P. Nilles Heterotic supersymmetry: the legacy of D=10 and N=4
H. Ooguri Conference Summary
E. Rabinovici (In) Stabilities and complementarity in AdS/CFT
S. Raju Scattering Amplitudes and AdS/CFT Correlators
O. Schlotterer Hidden simplicity in superstring amplitudes
J. Schwarz Opening Lecture
A. Strominger Progress in dS/CFT
A. Uranga Update on string phenomenology
C. Vafa Topological Strings and Their Diverse Applications
E. Witten Superstring Perturbation Theory Revisited
M. Yamazaki Networks, Quivers and 3-manifolds
X. Yin Higher Spin Holography

Strings 2013 will be held in Seoul, June 24-28.

Great job again with the update.
 D. Gross Outlook/Vision
I'm curious about what he'll have to say, considering the lackluster performance of string theory over the past few years.
 Recognitions: Science Advisor Have a look at these slides from "string 2007" and "strings 2009": http://strings2009.roma2.infn.it/tal..._Strings09.pdf, slide #16 http://www.ift.uam.es/strings07/040_...nces/gross.pdf, slide#22 where Gross asked some interesting questions - on which he probably is still waiting for reply: WHAT IS STRING THEORY? This is a strange question since we clearly know what string theory is to the extent that we can construct the theory and calculate some of its properties. However our construction of the theory has proceeded in an ad hoc fashion, often producing, for apparently mysterious reasons, structures that appear miraculous. It is evident that we are far from fully understanding the deep symmetries and physical principles that must underlie these theories. It is hoped that the recent efforts to construct covariant second quantized string field theories will shed light on this crucial question. We still do not understand what string theory is. We do not have a formulation of the dynamical principle behind ST. All we have is a vast array of dual formulations, most of which are defined by methods for constructing consistent semiclassical (perturbative) expansions about a given background (classical solution). What is the fundamental formulation of string theory? WHAT IS MISSING ? Perhaps “String theory” is like quantum field theory - a framework and not a definitive theory. Perhaps we are missing a fundamentally new principle of symmetry, of dynamics, of consistency, .... that leads to a unique solution --- not a “vacuum” but a space-time, a cosmology. Emergent Space-Time

 Quote by marcus I think he almost has to make some reference to that paper---the authors are so prominent. You're right about the Kortner talk, it's likely to be well worth watching! I'll do an update on the conference while I'm at it. About a week to go. Registration is at 384, half are listed as grad student, postdoc and the like. As of today titles of 24 of the 45 planned talks are listed. The strongest common theme appears to be CFT-based holography, i.e. gauge/gravity correspondence and its applications. To show thematic emphasis I've highlighted the CFT/holo talks: M. Aganagic Knots, Mirror Symmetry and Large N Duality F. Alday Mixed correlators in N=4 SYM M. Cvetič Non-perturbative Effects in F-theory Compactifications T. Dimofte Building blocks in 3d SCFT M. Gaberdiel Minimal Model Holography D. Gross Outlook/Vision G. Horowitz Why General Relativity is like a High Temperature Superconductor N. Iqbal Friedel oscillations and horizon charge in 1D holographic liquids A. Karch Recent Applications of the Gauge/Gravity Correspondence to QCD and Condensed Matter Physics S. Kachru New Horizons in Finite Density Field Theory and String Theory S. Kortner Status and latest results of the LHC H. Nicolai Alternative approaches to quantum gravity: a brief survey H.P. Nilles Heterotic supersymmetry: the legacy of D=10 and N=4 H. Ooguri Conference Summary E. Rabinovici (In) Stabilities and complementarity in AdS/CFT S. Raju Scattering Amplitudes and AdS/CFT Correlators O. Schlotterer Hidden simplicity in superstring amplitudes J. Schwarz Opening Lecture A. Strominger Progress in dS/CFT A. Uranga Update on string phenomenology C. Vafa Topological Strings and Their Diverse Applications E. Witten Superstring Perturbation Theory Revisited M. Yamazaki Networks, Quivers and 3-manifolds X. Yin Higher Spin Holography Strings 2013 will be held in Seoul, June 24-28.
Unfortunately, I have no holydays next week... I would have appreciate to ear some of the conferences. My preference goes to G. Horowitz. Do you know if outsider like me can get abstracts from a part of the conferences?

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 Quote by Blackforest Unfortunately, I have no holydays next week... I would have appreciate to ear some of the conferences. My preference goes to G. Horowitz. Do you know if outsider like me can get abstracts from a part of the conferences?
I hope and expect that video of all the talks will eventually be freely accessible online.
This is how it was last year when the Strings 2011 conference was held at Uppsala Sweden.

I'll do an update on the conference while I'm at it. Next year's Strings will be held in Seoul, June 24-28, 2013. Strings 2012 starts Monday 23 July. Registration at 384, about half being grad student, postdoc and the like. A prevalent topic appears to be CFT-based holography so I've highlighted the CFT/holo talks. As of today, titles of 28 of the 45 planned talks are listed.:

M. Aganagic Knots, Mirror Symmetry and Large N Duality
F. Alday Mixed correlators in N=4 SYM
J. Carrasco Generic multiloop methods for gauge and gravity scattering amplitudes, a guided tour with pedagogic aspiration
A. Castro Path integrals in 3D gravity
M. Cvetič Non-perturbative Effects in F-theory Compactifications
T. Dimofte Building blocks in 3d SCFT
M. Gaberdiel Minimal Model Holography
D. Gross Outlook/Vision
G. Horowitz Why General Relativity is like a High Temperature Superconductor
N. Iqbal Friedel oscillations and horizon charge in 1D holographic liquids
S. Kachru New Horizons in Finite Density Field Theory and String Theory
A. Karch Recent Applications of the Gauge/Gravity Correspondence to QCD and Condensed Matter Physics
S. Kortner Status and latest results of the LHC
H. Nicolai Alternative approaches to quantum gravity: a brief survey
H.P. Nilles Heterotic supersymmetry: the legacy of D=10 and N=4
H. Ooguri Conference Summary
A. Polyakov Quantum Instability of the de Sitter space
E. Rabinovici (In) Stabilities and complementarity in AdS/CFT
S. Raju Scattering Amplitudes and AdS/CFT Correlators
O. Schlotterer Hidden simplicity in superstring amplitudes
J. Schwarz Opening Lecture
A. Strominger Progress in dS/CFT
A. Uranga Update on string phenomenology
C. Vafa Topological Strings and Their Diverse Applications
E. Witten Superstring Perturbation Theory Revisited
M. Yamazaki Networks, Quivers and 3-manifolds
X. Yin Higher Spin Holography
B. Zwiebach Glimpses of Double Field Theory Geometry

I was intrigued by the title of Polyakov's talk: Quantum Instability of the de Sitter space
http://arxiv.org/abs/1106.1558
A String Model for AdS Gravity and Higher Spins,
I speculate that he tried to do something similar for dS space and found it didn't work. Hence a kind of negative result.
 Recognitions: Science Advisor The Newton Institute had a 6 month long programme Mathematics and Applications of Branes in String and M-theory. Many of its seminars online, which provides another view of current string concerns. String Phenomenology 2012 BSM Seminar List Lu Ran's talk incorporates consideration of some evidence for a gamma-ray line from dark matter annihilation in Fermi LAT's data.

 Quote by Mark M I wonder if Strominger will make any mention of the result of Hawking/Hartle/Hertog. That is, the paper in which they attempted to show that a negative cosmological constant would result in a positive acceleration of expansion.
yes, that's an interesting paper .. you should have been at the Brussels conference a few weeks ago, where all three, namely Hartle, Hawking, Hertog, and also Strominger, Susskind, ..., among others were present:
http://www.solvayinstitutes.be/event...cosmology.html
Hartle presented the paper you are referring to. Strominger's dS/CFT talk was a bit more vague.

The above statistics make me sad by the way ...

But thanks Marcus for gathering all this interesting info in one place!

Wakabaloola
 Recognitions: Gold Member Science Advisor The program of Strings 2012 is complete! Here is the list of talks: http://wwwth.mpp.mpg.de/members/stri...ram/talks.html Let's hope there are many interesting ones and that they become available as online video, or at least as slides PDF. I'd like very much to get other people's comment on the lineup of talks and the predominant topics. Maybe I should paste it in: M. Aganagic Knots, Mirror Symmetry and Large N Duality F. Alday Mixed correlators in N=4 SYM L. Anderson New Aspects of Heterotic Geometry and Phenomenology I. Antoniadis Aspects of string phenomenology in the new LHC era N. Arkani-Hamed Scattering Amplitudes and the Positive Grassmannian C. Bachas AdS4/CFT3 and Gravity Localization F. Cachazo Gravity in Twistor Space J. Carrasco Generic multiloop methods for gauge and gravity scattering amplitudes, a guided tour with pedagogic aspiration A. Castro Path integrals in 3D gravity M. Cvetič Non-perturbative Effects in F-theory Compactifications T. Dimofte Class R: A User's Guide S. Dimopoulos What has the LHC done to Theory? B. Freivogel Predictions from Eternal Inflation M. Gaberdiel Minimal Model Holography D. Gaiotto Domain walls and RG flows C. Gomez Black holes as graviton condensates at the critical point of a quantum phase transition D. Gross Outlook and Vision J. Heckman Covariant Non-Commutative Geometry From String Theory G. Horowitz Why General Relativity is like a High Temperature Superconductor N. Iqbal Friedel oscillations and horizon charge in 1D holographic liquids S. Kachru New Horizons in Finite Density Field Theory and String Theory A. Karch Recent Applications of the Gauge/Gravity Correspondence to QCD and Condensed Matter Physics Z. Komargodski Comments on the Renormalization Group and Diverse Applications S. Kortner Status and latest results of the LHC C. Kounnas Non-singular Superstring Cosmologies J. Maldacena Constraining theories with higher spin symmetry H. Nicolai Alternative approaches to quantum gravity: a brief survey H.P. Nilles Heterotic supersymmetry: the legacy of D=10 and N=4 H. Ooguri Conference Summary A. Polyakov Quantum Instability of the de Sitter space E. Rabinovici (In) Stabilities and complementarity in AdS/CFT L. Rastelli Bootstrapping the Superconformal Index O. Schlotterer Hidden simplicity in superstring amplitudes J. Schwarz Opening Lecture (I) N. Seiberg Chern-Simons Contact Terms E. Silverstein RG and unitarity in spacetime-dependent QFT A. Strominger Progress in dS/CFT A. Uranga Update on string phenomenology C. Vafa Topological Strings and Their Diverse Applications G. Veneziano Opening Lecture (II) E. Witten Superstring Perturbation Theory Revisited M. Yamazaki Networks, Quivers and 3-manifolds X. Yin Higher Spin Holography B. Zwiebach Glimpses of Double Field Theory Geometry
 Recognitions: Gold Member Science Advisor *speakers giving hour talks ("survey talks"). others have 30 minutes http://wwwth.mpp.mpg.de/members/stri...ram/talks.html Monday 23 J. Schwarz Opening Lecture (I) G. Veneziano Opening Lecture (II) A. Strominger Progress in dS/CFT E. Silverstein RG and unitarity in spacetime-dependent QFT F. Alday Mixed correlators in N=4 SYM A. Karch* Recent Applications of the Gauge/Gravity Correspondence to QCD and Condensed Matter Physics S. Kachru New Horizons in Finite Density Field Theory and String Theory G. Horowitz Why General Relativity is like a High Temperature Superconductor N. Iqbal Friedel oscillations and horizon charge in 1D holographic liquids E. Rabinovici (In) Stabilities and complementarity in AdS/CFT Tuesday 24 X. Yin* Higher Spin Holography M. Gaberdiel Minimal Model Holography E. Witten Superstring Perturbation Theory Revisited A. Castro Path integrals in 3D gravity J. Maldacena Constraining theories with higher spin symmetry J. Carrasco* Generic multiloop methods for gauge and gravity scattering amplitudes, a guided tour with pedagogic aspiration N. Arkani-Hamed Scattering Amplitudes and the Positive Grassmannian O. Schlotterer Hidden simplicity in superstring amplitudes F. Cachazo Gravity in Twistor Space Wednesday 25 A. Uranga* Update on string phenomenology M. Cvetič Non-perturbative Effects in F-theory Compactifications B. Zwiebach Glimpses of Double Field Theory Geometry J. Heckman Covariant Non-Commutative Geometry From String Theory L. Anderson New Aspects of Heterotic Geometry and Phenomenology Thursday 26 S. Dimopoulos* What has the LHC done to Theory? S. Kortner Status and latest results of the LHC H.P. Nilles Heterotic supersymmetry: the legacy of D=10 and N=4 I. Antoniadis Aspects of string phenomenology in the new LHC era N. Seiberg Chern-Simons Contact Terms H. Nicolai* Alternative approaches to quantum gravity: a brief survey B. Freivogel Predictions from Eternal Inflation C. Gomez Black holes as graviton condensates at the critical point of a quantum phase transition A. Polyakov Quantum Instability of the de Sitter space Friday 27 C. Vafa* Topological Strings and Their Diverse Applications M. Aganagic Knots, Mirror Symmetry and Large N Duality D. Gaiotto Domain walls and RG flows M. Yamazaki Networks, Quivers and 3-manifolds T. Dimofte Class R: A User's Guide Z. Komargodski Comments on the Renormalization Group and Diverse Applications C. Bachas AdS4/CFT3 and Gravity Localization L. Rastelli Bootstrapping the Superconformal Index C. Kounnas Non-singular Superstring Cosmologies H. Ooguri Conference Summary D. Gross Outlook and Vision
 Recognitions: Gold Member Science Advisor All these eight people's slides PDF (or powerpoint in some cases) are now posted online. I've looked at Strominger's and thought it was interesting. Would have liked an audio with it explaining some of the diagrams and cartoons: A. Strominger Progress in dS/CFT E. Silverstein RG and unitarity in spacetime-dependent QFT F. Alday Mixed correlators in N=4 SYM A. Karch* Recent Applications of the Gauge/Gravity Correspondence to QCD and Condensed Matter Physics S. Kachru New Horizons in Finite Density Field Theory and String Theory G. Horowitz Why General Relativity is like a High Temperature Superconductor N. Iqbal Friedel oscillations and horizon charge in 1D holographic liquids E. Rabinovici (In) Stabilities and complementarity in AdS/CFT Also looked at Horowitz and Kachru's slides. All nice presentations. Seem to be basically about finding apps for AdS/CFT. See also Karch survey talk. (applications of gauge/gravity). Probably applied holography is the main topic for Monday. Strominger's talk somehow bolder more ambitious---opens up wide horizon of unanswered questions about deSitter space, see the end of his talk. Just some preliminary impressions of mine. To get a better idea you should check it and some other talks out. *Karch gave the hour talk ("overview talk") today. The other's had 30-minute slots.
 Recognitions: Science Advisor Let me as a question: which talks address physical isues (like quantum gravity, big bang, black holes, particles and symmetries, unification, ...) and which talks address "home-made" problems of string theory?

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