The NATO Advanced Study Institute and EC Summer School "Progress in String Field and Particle Theory" was held in Cargse from June 25th till July 11th 2002. The main focus of the school was the recent progress in the very ac tive areas of superstring theory, quantum gravity and the theory of elementary particles. It covered topical problems in domains such as duality between gravity and gaugeinteractions, string field theory, tachyon condensation, non-commutative field theory, string cosmology and string phenomenology. The School featured daily introductory lectures and topical seminars. An informal Gong Show session allowed young post-doctoral researchers and senior graduate students to make a concise presentation oftheir current work. The School gave an excellent opportunity to the youngest researchers to establish a close relationship with their seniors and with the lecturers. These proceedings will further serve in fixing the acquired knowledge, and hopefully, become a useful reference for anyone working in this fascinating do main of physics. Some of the contributions provide an elementary introduction to their subject, while other ones are more geared to the specialist. We are deeply indebted to the NATO Division for Scientific Affairs for funding, and for their constant attention for our meetings, and to the European Commission for a High-Level Scientific Conference grant HPCFCT 2001-00298.

The NATO Advanced Study Institute and EC Summer School "Progress in String Field and Particle Theory" was held in Cargse from June 25th till July 11th 2002. The main focus of the school was the recent progress in the very ac tive areas of superstring theory, quantum gravity and the theory of elementary particles. It covered topical problems in domains such as duality between gravity and gaugeinteractions, string field theory, tachyon condensation, non-commutative field theory, string cosmology and string phenomenology. The School featured daily introductory lectures and topical seminars. An informal Gong Show session allowed young post-doctoral researchers and senior graduate students to make a concise presentation oftheir current work. The School gave an excellent opportunity to the youngest researchers to establish a close relationship with their seniors and with the lecturers. These proceedings will further serve in fixing the acquired knowledge, and hopefully, become a useful reference for anyone working in this fascinating do main of physics. Some of the contributions provide an elementary introduction to their subject, while other ones are more geared to the specialist. We are deeply indebted to the NATO Division for Scientific Affairs for funding, and for their constant attention for our meetings, and to the European Commission for a High-Level Scientific Conference grant HPCFCT 2001-00298.

Recent developments in supersymmetric field theory, string theory, and brane theory have been revolutionary. The main focus of the present volume is developments of M-theory and its applications to superstring theory, quantum gravity, and the theory of elementary particles. Topics included are D-branes, boundary states, and world volume solitons. Anti-De-Sitter quantum field theory is explained, emphasising the way it can enforce the holography principle, together with the relation to black hole physics and the way Branes provide the microscopic interpretation for the entropy of black holes. Developments in D-branes within type-I superstring and related theories are described. There are also possible phenomenological implications of superstring theory that would lie within the range of quantum gravity effects in the future generation of accelerators, around 1 TeV.

During its forty year lifespan, string theory has always had the power to divide, being called both a 'theory of everything' and a 'theory of nothing'. Critics have even questioned whether it qualifies as a scientific theory at all. This book adopts an objective stance, standing back from the question of the truth or falsity of string theory and instead focusing on how it came to be and how it came to occupy its present position in physics. An unexpectedly rich history is revealed, with deep connections to our most well-established physical theories. Fully self-contained and written in a lively fashion, the book will appeal to a wide variety of readers from novice to specialist.

At the first look, the String Theory seems just an interesting and non-trivial application of the quantum mechanics and the special relativity to vibrating strings. By itself, the quantization of relativistic strings does not call the attention of the particle physicist as a significant paradigm shift. However, when the string quantization is performed by applying the standard rules of the perturbative Quantum Field Theory, one discovers that the strings in certain states have the same physical properties as the gravity in the flat space-time. Chapter one of this book reviews the construction of the thermal bosonic string and D-brane in the framework of the Thermo Field Dynamics (TFD). It briefly recalls the well-known light-cone quantization of the bosonic string in the conformal gauge in flat space-time, and gives a bird's eye view of the fundamental concepts of the TFD. Chapter two examines a visual model inspired by string theory, on the system of interacting anyons. Chapter three investigate the late-time dynamic of the universe in a 7-dimensional cosmology in the presence of higher-order curvature terms arising from the heterotic string effective action. Chapter four discusses life resulting from strings, water, and DNA united by mislion. The final chapter provides new viewpoints of light quantum research on lightstring.

String theory is a model of fundamental physics whose building blocks are one-dimensional extended objects called strings, rather than the zero-dimensional point particles that form the basis for the standard model of particle physics. The phrase is often used as shorthand for Superstring theory, as well as related theories such as M-theory. By replacing the point-like particles with strings, an apparently consistent quantum theory of gravity emerges. Moreover, it may be possible to 'unify' the known natural forces (gravitational, electromagnetic, weak nuclear and strong nuclear) by describing them with the same set of equations. Studies of string theory have revealed that it predicts higher-dimensional objects called branes. String theory strongly suggests the existence of ten or eleven (in M-theory) space-time dimensions, as opposed to the usual four (three spatial and one temporal) used in relativity theory.

Intended mainly for advanced graduate students in theoretical physics, this comprehensive volume covers recent advances in string theory and field theory dualities. It is based on the annual lectures given at the School of the Theoretical Advanced Study Institute (2003) a traditional event that brings together graduate students in high energy physics for an intensive course given by leaders in their fields.The first lecture by Paul Aspinwall is a description of branes in Calabi-Yau manifolds, which includes an introduction to the modern ideas of derived categories and their relation to D-branes. Juan Maldacena's second lecture is a short introduction to the AdS/CFT correspondence with a short discussion on its plane wave limit. Tachyon condensation for open strings is discussed in the third lecture by Ashoke Sen while Eva Silverstein provides a useful summary of the various attempts to produce four-dimensional physics out of string theory and M-theory in the fourth lecture. Matthew Strassler's fifth lecture is a careful discussion of a theory that has played a very important role in recent developments in string theory — a quantum field theory that produces a duality cascade which also has a large N gravity description. The sixth lecture by Washington Taylor explains how to perform perturbative computations using string field theory.The written presentation of these lectures is detailed yet straightforward, and they will be of great use to both students and experienced researchers in high energy theoretical physics.