Problems in Theoretical Physics

该奖项资助加州大学圣巴巴拉分校（UCSB）约瑟夫·波尔钦斯基（Joseph Polchinski）和罗伯特·休格（Robert Sugar）教授的研究活动。这两位教授的研究是在高能物理领域。该领域的长期目标是确定物质的基本组成部分，并确定它们之间的相互作用，从而产生我们所观察到的物理世界。通过所谓的高能物理标准模型的发展，在实现这些目标方面取得了巨大进展，该模型提供了对自然界四种相互作用中的三种的基本描述：强、电磁和弱。缺少的是一个关于引力的基本理论，以及引力与其他相互作用的统一。波尔钦斯基在这项资助下的工作目标是创造这些缺失的元素。相比之下，休格的研究旨在进行非常精确的计算，当与同样精确的实验相结合时，将为标准模型提供严格的测试，并可能指出该模型的故障，这将需要发展新的物理思想。因此，该奖项下的研究通过促进科学在其最基本的方向之一的进步来促进国家利益。除了有助于加深对物理基本定律的理解外，该项目还有望产生更广泛的重大影响。研究生和博士后的教育是该基金的主要活动。此外，与Sugar教授的研究相关的部分努力旨在为在相关领域工作的整个美国物理学家社区开发大规模计算基础设施。所采取的方法在许多科学和工程领域的计算密集型问题上具有广泛的应用可能性。从技术上讲，量子引力的研究将集中在弦和膜的动力学上，特别是在黑洞视界附近。膜动力学在弦紧化中的作用也将变得精确。将研究量子场论和全息术中的广泛问题，重点是基本原理。晶格规范理论的研究将集中在多种应用规范组态的产生、光赝标量介子和B介子的性质以及介子的异常磁矩。

This award funds the research activities of Professors Joseph Polchinski and Robert Sugar at the University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB). The research of these two professors is in the field of high energy physics. The long-term objectives of this field are to identify the basic building blocks of matter and to determine the interactions among them that give rise to the physical world we observe. Great progress has been made towards these objectives through the development of the so-called Standard Model of high energy physics, which provides fundamental descriptions of three of the four interactions of nature: the strong, electromagnetic and weak. What is missing is a fundamental theory of gravity, and the unification of gravity with the other interactions. The objective of Polchinski's work under this grant is to create these missing elements. Sugar's research, by contrast, is aimed at making very precise calculations which, when combined with equally precise experiments, will provide rigorous tests of the Standard Model and possibly point to breakdowns of this model that will require the development of new physical ideas. Thus, research under this award advances the national interest by promoting the progress of science in one of its most fundamental directions. In addition to contributing to a deeper understanding of the fundamental laws of physics, this project is also expected to have significant broader impacts. The education of graduate students and postdoctoral fellows is a major activity of the grant. Moreover, part of the effort associated with Professor Sugar's research is aimed at developing large-scale computational infrastructure for the entire U.S. community of physicists working in related areas. The approach being taken has broad possibilities for application to computationally-intensive problems in many areas of science and engineering. More technically, research in quantum gravity will focus on the dynamics of strings and branes, especially near the black hole horizon. The role of brane dynamics in string compactification will also be made precise. A wide range of questions in quantum field theory and holography will be studied, focusing on basic principles. Research in lattice gauge theory will be directed at the generation of gauge configurations for multiple applications, the properties of the light pseudoscalar mesons and B mesons, and the anomalous magnetic moment of the muon.