[no subject]

[Catherine Broderick <cbroderi brandeis edu>]

Tuesday, January 30, 2007
Martin Weiner Lecture Series--Physics Colloquium
Physics Building   Abelson 131 - 4:00pm
Dr. Christopher Herzog
"Applied String Theory: Viscosity, Drag, and RHIC"

Recent progress in string theory has provided us with
a theoretical laboratory for studying strongly interacting,
non-equilibrium processes in hot non-abelian plasmas.
These processes are important experimentally for
understanding elliptic flow and  jet quenching in
heavy ion collisions at RHIC.  Standard
field theoretic tools such as perturbation theory and
lattice gauge theory are not well suited to this
strongly coupled, time dependent regime.
I will discuss string theory calculations of the
viscosity and heavy quark diffusion constant
in maximally supersymmetric Yang Mills theory and their relevance
for QCD and understanding elliptic flow and jet quenching
at RHIC.

Refreshments at 3:30 outside Abelson 131