The Search for Superstrings, Symmetry, and the Theory of Everything

by John Gribbin

Paperback, 2000

Status

Available

Call number

530.142

Collection

Publication

Back Bay Books (2000), Paperback, 224 pages

Description

No one is more successful than this author when it comes to making the cutting edge of physics more accessible to a broad lay audience. In Schrodinger's Kittens, he took readers to the eerie world of subatomic particles & waves. Now, he explores the most exciting area of research in physics today: string theory. Following a series of major breakthroughs in the 1990s, physicists are putting together a clearer picture of how subatomic particles work. By hypothesizing particles as a single loop of vibrating "string," they are on the brink of discovering a way to explain all of nature's forces in a single theory. Grandly named "superstrings," & incorporating the ideas of "supersymmetry," these models are the prime candidate for the long sought-for "Theory of Everything." Written in clear & accessible language. The Search for Superstrings, Symmetry, & the Theory of Everything brings to life the remarkable scientific research that is on the cusp of radically altering our conception of the universe.… (more)

User reviews

LibraryThing member hcubic
For most of us chemists, our knowledge of the universe is pretty good from the atomic level upward, but when students ask us (as they sometimes do) about what it is that holds the nucleus together, or what a "string" is, or about quarks, leptons, and any of the other particles that are not
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electrons, protons, or neutrons, we begin to mumble. "The Search for Superstrings..." is a good solution to our problem. It is brief (less than 250 pages), and most of us can skip some of the first chapter (Quantum Physics for Beginners). Gribbon writes well. He skips complexities where he can, and mathematics altogether. I think his best book is the first one of his that I read, "In Search of Schroedinger's Cat", which has been updated as "Schroedinger's Kittens and the Search for Reality", but this one is also recommended.
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Original publication date

1998

Physical description

224 p.; 5.5 inches

ISBN

0316326143 / 9780316326148
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