This volume contains the proceedings of a meeting held at Imperial College which is devoted to recent developments in string theory, supersymmetry and quantum gravity. The volume comprises two different sections. The first consists of five pedagogical reviews by prominent physicists, covering the currently important subjects of supermembranes, duality, D-branes, new non-perturbative methods and string phenomenology. The second section consists of research reports in these areas and also on other currently important topics such as supersymmetric gauge theories, two-dimensional quantum gravity and black holes.

This is the first systematic introduction to electromagnetic duality and its generalisations. The authors are the leading figures in this exciting new area of mathematical physics, and their lectures have been organised not only to link with each other but also to describe the fundamental ideas, the latest developments, and some earlier work whose significance has only recently become apparent. This will be essential reading for all those working in mathematical physics.

The areas covered in this volume include: duality in string theory and supersymmetric gauge theories; phenomenological applications of string theory; strings in curved spacetime; quantum gravity; SUSY conformal field theories; QCD strings; aspects of mathematical physics, including: mirror symmetry, W-algebras, representation theory.

This book introduces path integrals, a powerful method for describing quantum phenomena, and then uses them to compute anomalies in quantum field theories. An advanced text for researchers and graduate students of quantum field theory and string theory, it also provides a stand-alone introduction to path integrals in quantum mechanics.

Contents:Black Hole Evaporation and Quantum Gravity (K Schoutens et al.)A String Project in Multicolor QCD (V Kazakov)Matrix Models and String Theory (K Demeterfi & I Klebanov)Developments in 2D String Theory (A Jevicki)Exact Results for Two-Dimensional N = 2 Supersymmetric Theories — An Introduction to the tt∗ Equations (S Cecotti)Perturbative Topological Field Theory (R Dijkgraaf)Barriers in Quantum Gravity (J Ambjørn)Two-Dimensional Black Hole and Nonperturbative String Theory (A Dhar)U(N) Gauge Theory and Lattice Strings (I K Kostov)Quantization of Mirror Symmetry (H Ooguri)W-Strings 93 (C N Pope)Applications of O(d,d) Transformations to Generate New Geometries (S P Khastgir & J Maharana) Readership: High energy physicists. keywords:

The COPROMAPH Conference series has now evolved into a significant international arena where fundamental concepts in mathematical and theoretical physics and their applications can be conceived, developed and disseminated. The contributions in this volume address a variety of contemporary problems in mathematical and theoretical physics.

This book consists of about 20 lectures on theoretical and observational aspects of astrophysical black holes, by experts in the field. The basic principles and astrophysical applications of the black hole magnetosphere and the Blandford-Znajek process are reviewed in detail, as well as accretion by black holes, black hole X-Ray binaries, black holes with cosmic strings, and so on. Recent advances in X-Ray observations of galactic black holes and new understanding of supermassive black holes in AGNs and normal galaxies are also discussed.

The realization that precision LEP data lend support to the idea of supersymmetric grand unification and supersymmetry in general, led to the organization of the First HARC International Workshop on Recent Advances in the SuperWorld. The idea was to have a workshop that discussed all aspects of the supersymmetric world — the SuperWorld as it should be properly known. These aspects are so diverse that they are usually studied by high energy physicists with vastly different interests. The selection of speakers included the whole spectrum in 'energy', from experimental physicists, to specialists in low energy phenomenology, supersymmetric grand unification, supergravity, superstrings and supercosmology.