Spring 2005

Physics 135c
String Theory

Instructor information: 

Michael Schulz
mschulz at theory.caltech.edu
414 Downs, x2629

Office Hours:  Tuesday 4:15 pm

Description: A basic course in string theory designed to be accessible to a broad audience.   The main topics to be discussed include the motion of relativistic point particles and strings, actions, worldsheet symmetries and currents, lightcone quantization, and the spectra of relativistic open and closed strings.   The course will conclude with an exploration of D-branes, T-duality, or string thermodynamics, depending upon the interests of the participants.

Course information
Questionaire
Supplementary materials

Announcement (5/19): Problem Set 6 will now be graded on the basis of three problems for full credit. Due to an error in the original formulation of Problem 1, this problem is now extra credit and the deadline for submitting a solution to Problem 1 has been extended for one week. See the corrections page for further details.

Announcement (4/21): On April 28, there will be a guest instructor -- Andrew Frey.

Notes (everything that was on the blackboard): March 28, 30; April 5, 7, 12*, 14, 19, 21, 26*, 28; May 3, 5, 10, 12, 19, 24, 26, 31; June 2
* An asterisk indicates that the notes have been updated since they originally appeared.

Problem Sets (now due on Thursday): 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, final problem set and hints for problem 4
Corrections to Problem Sets

The required textbook is Zwiebach, A First Course in String Theory (Cambridge, 2004).
A list of textbook corrections can be found here.

Anonymous feedback (accessible within Caltech only)

Teaching Assistants:

Tristan McLoughlin
tristanm at theory.caltech.edu
441 Lauritsen, x4420

Office hours: Wednesday 8:00 pm

Mihai Bondarescu (starting April 26)
mihai at theory.caltech.edu
441 Lauritsen, x4420, 628-4992 (cell)

Office hours: Wednesday 8:00 pm