Title: An Introduction To N=1 Supergravity
Gianguido Dall'Agata and Rodolfo Russo
We will review matter couplings in supergravity, discuss the scalar sigma model, the potential, the superpotential and D-terms for minimal supersymmetric models. We will then discuss some phenomenological aspects, mainly connected with supersymmetry breaking, the selection of the vacuum and the rigid limits. We will especially focus the lectures on the differences between the global supersymmetric theories and supergravity, so that the students may better understand what really needs supergravity and what can already be implemented in a globally supersymmetric theory without the need of considering gravity effects.
Schedule:
28 May and 4 Jun 14.00-16.00,
7 Jun 15.00-17.00,
8 Jun 14.00-16.00,
9 Jun 11.00-13.00,
Room 208
Title: What is a Gerbe?
David Berman
This is an introduction to Gerbes aimed at physicists. The approach will be to introduce Cech cohmology and its relation to gauge theories, monopoles and Wilson loops and then give the extension to extend these ideas to the relation between higher order Cech cohomolgy, gerbes and strings.
Schedule:
4 Feb 10.00-11.00,
11 Feb 10.00-11.00,
Room 208
Title: The Simplest Gauge-String Duality
Sanjaye Ramgoolam
The large N expansion of two-dimensional Yang-Mills theory (YM2) on a 2D spacetime can be expressed as a generating function of Euler characters of holomorphic maps of string worldsheets to spacetime. Schur-Weyl duality and a classic theorem of Hurwitz connecting combinatorics to holomorphic maps are central to this story. We will review these results from the mid-nineties. We will then describe the connections of this simplest gauge-string duality to recent developments: free fermions and giant gravitons, the role of Brauer algebras in complex Matrix models, and the new holomorphic formulation of the "coupled" expansion of YM2.
Some relevant papers:
hep-th/9303046
Sects. 1-7 of hep-th/9411210
0709.2158
0802.3662
0804.2764
Schedule:
26 Nov 11.00-13.00,
3 Dec 11.00-13.00,
Room 208
