This three-year award for US-France cooperative research in theoretical physics involves Burt Ovrut of the University of Pennsylvania, Richard Grimm of the Centre de Physique Theorique in Marseille, and Ignatius Antoniadis of the Centre de Physique Theorique of the Ecole Polytechnique in Paliseau, France. The collaboration is aimed at a more systematic understanding of the point particle limit, or low energy limit of string theory and of the patterns of dualities relating different string theories. The investigators will study dualities and compactification of schemes with particular emphasis on the role of non-zero modes and on possible effective theories of supersymmetry and supergravity.
The US investigator is an expert in string and supersymmetric theories. This is complemented by the French investigators' expertise in string theory duality and compactification and in differential geometric description of theories of supersymmetry and supergravity. The project addresses problems related to the development of a unified theory of all physical phenomena.
