Think of a guitar string that has been tuned by stretching the string under tension across the guitar. Depending on how the string is plucked and how much tension is in the string, different musical notes will be created by the string. These musical notes could be said to be excitation modes of that guitar string under tension.
In a similar manner, in string theory, the elementary particles we observe in particle accelerators could be thought of as the “musical notes” or excitation modes of elementary strings. These strings need 10 dimensions to vibrate properly. So this theory predicts the existence of extra 6 hidden dimensions in our 4 dimensional universe!
String theory books:
“A First Course in String Theory”, by Barton Zweibach. (This is a text book for undergraduate physics students.) Amazon
“String Theory and M-Theory: A Modern Introduction”. by Katrin Becker, Melanie Becker, and John H. Schwarz ( If you are enough matured in mathematics, then directly take you to the business.) Amazon
“String Theory ( vol 1 & 2 )” by Joseph Polchinski . Amazon
“Elegent Universe : Superstrings, Hidden Dimensions, and the Quest for the Ultimate Theory” by Brian Greene. (A Book for general public/non-scientists which really created craze about string theory) Amazon
Physics & Math Books :
Quantum Field Theory by Lewis H. Ryder
An Introduction To Quantum Field Theory (Frontiers in Physics) by Michael E. Peskin and Dan V. Schroeder
The Geometry of Physics: An Introduction by Theodore Frankel
Geometry, Topology and Physics, (Graduate Student Series in Physics) by Mikio Nakahara
String Theory sites :
Official String Theory Website : http://www.superstringtheory.com
Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/String_theory
String Wiki : http://www.stringwiki.org
Introduction to String Theory : http://www.slimy.com/~steuard/research/MITClub2004/slide01.html
The Second Superstring Revolution : http://www.theory.caltech.edu/people/jhs/strings/index.html
String Theory and the Unification of Forces:http://theory.tifr.res.in/~mukhi/Physics/string.html
Superstrings at Cambridge: http://www.damtp.cam.ac.uk/user/gr/public/qg_ss.html
Superstring Theory page at Cornell: http://www.lassp.cornell.edu/GraduateAdmissions/greene/greene.html
Superstring Theory page at UCSB: http://www.physics.ucsb.edu/~jpierre/strings/
Michio Kaku’s Website : http://www.mkaku.org
Prof. Allen Hatchers webpage; Topology links and downloads: http://www.math.cornell.edu/~hatcher/
This page is under construction. Lectures and important papers will be added soon.
