Strings '99 - in search of the theory of everything
The program of the conference provided a host of offerings. The 46 lectures focused on topics such as:
• Quantum physics of black holes (especially Hawking radiation)
• Black holes and their "microscopic" explanation in string theory
• Quantum cosmology
• Higher dimensions of space and time
• Generalizations of string theories, as e.g. relativistic membranes, "p-branes” and matrix models
• Models of non-commutative geometries of space and time
• Newly observable effects of string theory in astrophysics and elementary particle physics
• String theory and conformal quantum field theory
• Mathematics and string theory
The conference made important progress in all of these areas. In particular, the new results on the relationship between non-communicative geometry and string theory, which were presented for the first time at this conference, could prove to be ground-breaking for future developments in string theory. Hermann Nicolai emphasized: "This would enable us to understand how string theory dissolves the space-time continuum at very small distances and replaces it with 'quantum space-time'.”
The Albert Einstein Institute, headquartered in Golm near Potsdam, was instrumental in organizing the conference. Founded just four years ago, it is already one of the most important research centres in the field of gravitational physics. However, the success of the conference was also due to the special dedication and commitment of the other members of the local organizing committee: Prof. Olaf Lechtenfeld (University of Hannover), Prof. Jan Louis (University of Halle), Prof. Dieter Lüst (Humboldt University Berlin), who is also a Scientific Member of the Albert Einstein Institute and Dr. Kurt Miesel (University of Potsdam), as well as a large number of helpers from the participating institutions.
The public highlight of the conference was an event on Saturday afternoon, where the Albert Einstein Institute and the Einstein Forum in Potsdam had been invited to the Auditorium Maximum of Potsdam University. The public showed an overwhelming interest in hearing first-hand about the current state of research in this area. Well over a thousand people turned out to experience in person the world-famous physicist Stephen Hawking, the leading string theorist Edward Witten, as well as the expert on relativistic astrophysics and Managing Director of the Albert Einstein Institute, Prof. Bernard F. Schutz. In addition to the Auditorium Maximum, which accommodates 420 people, the university transferred the event via video to five other lecture halls, so that more than a thousand people could follow the lectures. Another three hundred people gathered on the meadow in front of the Auditorium Maximum and listened spellbound and still to the words of the physicists, which were transmitted outside with loudspeakers.
The history of string conferences
Strings '99 in Potsdam was the eleventh in the series of "Strings" conferences. The tradition of string theorists of meeting annually at an international "Strings" conference in order to exchange new ideas and results began in 1985 in Argonne, USA. During the previous year, the physicists John Schwarz and Michael Green initiated the first revolution in string theory that created hopes of using string theory to combine quantum and gravitational theory with one another. The 1995 Strings conference in Los Angeles was in the showplace of the second revolution: Ed Witten showed that all string theories could be combined into one intellectual structure. In 1997 the Strings Conference took place in Amsterdam and thereby for the first time in Europe. In 1999, Germany was the host and thus established itself as a significant participant in the search for the theory of everything.
String theory and its developments
Summary
For the scientific layman, physics appears to deal with seemingly completely different topics. Mechanics, thermodynamics, optics, electricity, magnetism, atomic physics and nuclear physics are examples thereof. Yet the British physicist Maxwell, in 1873, was able to describe electrical, magnetic, and optical phenomena of physics in a uniform manner. At the end of the twentieth century, with Einstein’s general theory of relativity and the standard model of particle physics we now have physical theories that describe natural processes over a vast range of distances, from the diameter of a proton to the diameter of the visible universe. And all by using mathematical formulas that fit on a piece of paper!
However, the search of physicists for a comprehensive, unified theory encounters a hard mathematical limit in an attempt to reconcile gravity and quantum theory. String theory seeks to overcome this. It no longer interprets elementary particles as point-shaped but rather as threadlike structures. This has given rise to the hope that string theory can also be used to explain the origin of matter.
The search of physicists for a unified theory also borders on metaphysics. There is a continuing fascination with this Holy Grail of physics – and not just for researchers. With the enormous ranges in size that physics spans, it reaches the limits of what the human mind can comprehend.