Strings 2020

Europe/Zurich
Description

The Strings conferences have been annual events since 1988 (one year was missed in the 1990’s) and are the major international meeting on string theory as a framework for a new understanding of physics. These conferences generally feature a wide range of talks on contemporary developments involving quantum fields, strings, and gravity, as well as connections with condensed matter physics, quantum information and mathematics and have developed into the premier event in the theoretical physics calendar. This large gathering allows researchers from different parts of the world to interact across sub-fields and the conference regularly sees the presence of many of the most eminent theoretical physicists in the world and has served as the site for the announcement of several major discoveries in the field.

This year the Strings conference will see two major new developments. For the first time in its 30 year history it will be hosted by an institution on the African continent and, another first, it will be run as a virtual conference.

The conference itself will be hosted on Zoom (link provided by email upon registration) and live-streamed to Youtube. There is also a slack channel which you are encouraged to join here.

Public Talk

On Wednesday, July 1st there will be a public lecture delivered by Shamit Kachru (Stanford) titled "The hidden geometry of spacetime". This will be streamed live on Youtube and on Zoom at 8pm (GMT+2).

Invited Speakers

Ibrahima Bah, Alexander Belin, Clay Cordova, Roger Deane, Netta Engelhardt, Rajesh Gopakumar, David Gross*, Shamit Kachru, Charlotte Kristjansen, Juan Maldacena, Samir Mathur, David Meltzer, Shiraz Minwalla, Joao Penedones, Geoff Penington, Andrea Puhm, Suvrat Raju, Nathan Seiberg, Ashoke Sen, Charlotte Sleight, Douglas Stanford, Andy Strominger, Cumrun Vafa, Yifan Wang, Edward Witten & Xi Yin

Programme Committee

Fernando Alday, Agnese Bissi, Alejandra Castro, Robert de Mello Koch, Shiraz Minwalla, Kyriakos Papadodimas & Malcolm Perry (Chair)

Organising Committee

Pallab Basu, Robert de Mello Koch, Kevin Goldstein, Shajid Haque, Shinji Hirano, Will Horowitz, Vishnu Jejjala, Nathan Moynihan, Jeff Murugan (Chair), Sanjay Ramgoolam, Joao Rodrigues, Jonathan Shock, Amanda Weltman & Costas Zubos

International Advisory Board

Luis Alday, Luis Alvarez-Gaume, Kostas Bachas, Micha Berkooz, Nathan Berkovits, Ruth Britto, Horacio Casini, Alejandra Castro, Mirjam Cvetic, Atish Dabholkar, Jan de Boer, Robbert Dijkgraaf, Johana Erdmenger, Mboyo Esole, Jerome Gauntlett, Jim Gates, Rajesh Gopakumar, Mariana Grana, Michael Green, David Gross, Daniel Grumiller, Jeff Harvey, Marc Henneaux, Veronika Hubeny, Marina Huerta, Janet Hung, Antal Jevicki, Clifford Johnson, Shamit Kachru, Igor Klebanov, Finn Larsen, Yolanda Lozano, Kimyeong Lee, Dieter Luest, Juan Maldacena, Shiraz Minwalla, Rob Myers, Hirosi Ooguri, Leo Pando-Zayas, Silvia Penati, Fernando Quevedo, Eliezer Rabinovici, John Schwarz, Nathan Seiberg, Ashok Sen, Steve Shenker, Eva Silverstein, Wei Song, Andy Strominger, Tadashi Takayanagi, Sandeep Trivedi, Cumrun Vafa, Anastasia Volovich, Spenta Wadia, Edward Witten, Konstantin Zarembo

Past & Future Strings Conferences

Strings 2022, Vienna, Austria
Strings 2021, Sao Paulo, Brazil
Strings 2019, Brussels, Belgium
Strings 2018, Okinawa, Japan
Strings 2017, Israel
Strings 2016, Beijing, China
Strings 2015, Bengaluru, India
Strings 2014, Princeton, USA
Strings 2013, Seoul, Korea
Strings 2012, Munich, Germany
Strings 2011 Uppsala, Sweden
Strings 2010 Texas, USA
Strings 2009, Rome, Italy
Strings 2008, CERN, Switzerland
Strings 2007, Madrid, Spain
Strings 2006, Beijing, China
Strings 2005, Toronto, Canada
Strings 2004, Paris, France
Strings 2003, Kyoto, Japan
Strings 2002, Cambridge, United Kingdom
Strings 2001, Mumbai, India
Strings 2000, Ann Arbor, USA
Strings 1999, Potsdam, Germany
Strings 1998, Santa Barbara, USA
Strings 1997, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
Strings 1996, Santa Barbara, USA
Strings 1995, Los Angeles, USA

 

Code of Conduct

This event is committed to providing a harassment-free conference experience for everyone, regardless of race, ethnicity, gender, gender identity and expression, age, sexual orientation, disability, physical appearance, body size, religion or lack thereof. We do not tolerate harassment of event participants in any form. Online bullying, sexual language and imagery is not appropriate for any event venue, including talks, breakaway sessions, online social gatherings, Facebook, Twitter and other online media. Strings participants violating these rules may be sanctioned or expelled from the event.

Participants
    • 14:00 17:00
      Main Session: Monday 2pm
      Convener: Amanda Weltman (University of Cape Town)
      • 14:00
        Opening Address 30m
        Speaker: Mamokgethi Phakeng (UCT Vice Chancellor)
      • 14:30
        Review: First results and potential African expansion of the Event Horizon Telescope 1h
        Speaker: Roger Deane (University of Pretoria)
      • 16:00
        Deriving the AdS$_3$/CFT$_2$ Correspondence 40m
        Speaker: Rajesh Gopakumar (ICTS, Bangalore)
    • 17:00 20:30
      Main Session: Monday 5pm
      Convener: Joao Rodrigues (Wits University)
      • 17:00
        JT gravity with defects and 3D gravity 40m
        Speaker: Henry Maxfield (UC Santa Barbara)
      • 18:00
        AdS/dCFT and integrable boundary states 40m
        Speaker: Charlotte Kristjansen (Niels Bohr Institute)
      • 19:00
        Social Zoom 1h 30m
    • 14:00 17:00
      Main Session: Tuesday 2pm
      Convener: Leopoldo Pando-Zayas (Michigan)
      • 14:00
        String Lamppost and the Swampland 40m
        Speaker: Cumrun Vafa (Harvard)
      • 15:00
        D-instanton perturbation theory 40m
        Speaker: Ashoke Sen (Harish-Chandra Research Institute)
      • 16:00
        New holographic CFTs: finding the needle in the haystack 40m
        Speaker: Alexandre Belin (CERN)
    • 17:00 20:00
      Main Session: Tuesday 5pm
      Convener: Hirosi Ooguri (Caltech/Kavli IPMU)
      • 17:00
        D-instanton Calculus in c=1 String Theory 40m
        Speaker: Xi Yin (Harvard)
      • 18:00
        Simple Models of Evaporating Black Holes 40m
        Speaker: Netta Engelhardt (Massachusetts Institute of Technology)
    • 14:00 17:00
      Main Session: Wednesday 2pm
      Convener: Ofer Aharony (Weizmann)
      • 14:00
        Review: Fractons for Field Theorists and Field Theory of Fractons 1h
        Speaker: Nathan Seiberg (IAS)
      • 15:30
        Anomalies of SCFTs and geometric engineering in M-theory 40m
        Speaker: Ibrahima Bah (Johns Hopkins University)
    • 17:00 19:00
      Main Session: Wednesday 5pm
      Convener: Mariana Graña (Institut de Physique Théorique)
      • 17:00
        Taming Defects in N=4 Super-Yang-Mills 40m
        Speaker: Yifan Wang (Harvard)
      • 18:00
        Higher-Group Symmetry and Applications 40m
        Speaker: Clay Cordova (Chicago)
    • 20:00 21:30
      Public Session
      Convener: Jonathan Shock (University of Cape Town)
      • 20:00
        Public Talk: The hidden geometry of spacetime 1h
        Speaker: Shamit Kachru (Stanford)
    • 14:00 17:00
      Main Session: Thursday 2pm
      Convener: Marika Taylor (Southhampton)
      • 14:00
        Constraints on Tree Level Gravitational Scattering 40m
        Speaker: Shiraz Minwalla (TIFR)
      • 15:00
        Asymptotic symmetries and celestial CFT 40m
        Speaker: Andrea Puhm (Ecole Polytechnique)
      • 16:00
        Nonperturbative Mellin Amplitudes 40m
        Speaker: Joao Penedones (IPT Lausanne)
    • 17:00 21:00
      Main Session: Thursday 5pm
      Convener: Igor Klebanov (Princeton)
    • 14:00 15:00
      Main Session
      Convener: Nathan Berkovits (ICTP-SAIFR)
      • 14:00
        Review: Recent progress on the black hole information paradox 1h
        Speaker: Juan Maldacena (IAS)
    • 15:30 19:00
      Black Hole Information: Special Session
      Convener: Anastasia Volovich (Brown)
    • 19:00 22:30
      Main Session: Final Session
      Convener: Jeff Murugan (University of Cape Town)
      • 19:00
        Black Hole Information Panel Discussion 2h
        Speakers: Maldacena, Almheiri, Engelhardt, Mathur, Penington, Raju, Stanford, Strominger, Marolf, Perry (Moderator)
      • 21:00
        Vision: David Gross 15m