Description
CAMBRIDGE Gravity and Strings 2007 Edition by Tomas Ortin
One appealing feature of string theory is that it provides a theory of quantum gravity. Gravity and Strings is a self-contained, pedagogical exposition of this theory, its foundations and its basic results. In Part I, the foundations are traced back to the very early special-relativistic field theories of gravity, showing how such theories lead to general relativity. Gauge theories of gravity are then discussed and used to introduce supergravity theories. In Part II, some of the most interesting solutions of general relativity and its generalizations are studied. The final Part presents and studies string theory from the effective action point of view, using the results found earlier in the book as background. This 2004 book will be useful as a reference book for graduate students and researchers, as well as a complementary textbook for courses on gravity, supergravity and string theory. Table of contents :- Preface; Part I. Introduction to Gravity and Supergravity: 1. Differential geometry; 2. Noether's theorems; 3. A perturbative introduction to general relativity; 4. Action principles for gravity; 5. N = 1, 2, d = 4 supergravities; 6. Conserved charges in general relativity; Part II. Gravitating Point-Particles: 7. The Schwarzschild black hole; 8. The Reissner-Nordstroem black hole; 9. The Taub-NUT solution; 10. Gravitational pp-waves; 11. The Kaluza-Klein black hole; 12. Dilaton and dilaton/axion black holes; 13. Unbroken supersymmetry; Part III. Gravitating Extended Objects of String Theory: 14. String theory; 15. The string effective action and T duality; 16. From eleven to four dimensions; 17. The type-IIB superstring and type-II T duality; 18. Extended objects; 19. The extended objects of string theory; 20. String black holes in four and five dimensions; Appendix A. Lie groups, symmetric spaces and Yang-Mills fields; Appendix B. Gamma matrices and spinors; Appendix C. n-Spheres; Appendix D. Palatini's identity; Appendix E. Conformal rescalings; Appendix F. Connections and curvature components; Appendix G. The harmonic operator on R3 x S1; References; Index.