Lectures from the CERN Winter School on Supergravity, Strings, and Gauge Theory, CERN, 25–29 January, 2010
Johannes Walcher · Classical and Quantum Gravity · 2010
This special section is devoted to the proceedings of the CERN Winter School on Supergravity, Strings and Gauge Theory 2010, which took place at CERN in Geneva, Switzerland, from 25–29 January 2010. This event was organized in the tradition of the yearly training schools of the former EC–RTN string network `Constituents, Fundamental Forces and Symmetries of the Universe'. Previous schools in this series were organized in 2005 at SISSA in Trieste and from 2006–2009 at CERN. Other similar schools have been organized in the past by the former related RTN `The Quantum Structure of Spacetime and the Geometric Nature of Fundamental Interactions'. Since 2009, the school has been funded by CERN and the Arnold Sommerfeld Center at Ludwig–Maximilians University of Munich. The event is organized by the Theoretical Physics Division, CERN Physics Department. The 2011 school will take place from 24–28 January 2011. As with its predecessors, this school was meant primarily for training doctoral students and young postdoctoral researchers in recent developments in theoretical high-energy physics and string theory. The programme consisted of five series of pedagogical lectures of four hours each, complemented by tutorial discussion sessions in the afternoons. The school was attended by approximately 140 participants from around the world. The topics of the lecture series were chosen to represent a broad section of current research, from cosmology and string phenomenology to mathematical physics, and gauge theory to properties of quantum black holes. Lecturers were invited based on their expertise and ability to communicate with students.