Nucleation of p-branes and fundamental strings.
We construct a solution to the low-energy string equations of motion in five dimensions that describes a circular loop of fundamental string exponentially expanding in a background electric $H$-field. Euclideanising this gives an instanton for the creation of a loop of fundamental string in a background $H$-field, and we calculate the rate of nucleation. Solutions describing magnetically charged strings and $p$-branes, where the gauge field comes from Kaluza-Klein reduction on a circle, are also constructed. It is known that a magnetic flux tube in four (reduced) spacetime dimensions is unstable to the pair creation of Kaluza-Klein monopoles. We show that in $(4+p)$ dimensions, magnetic $(p+1)$ ``fluxbranes" are unstable to the nucleation of a magnetically charged spherical $p$-brane. In ten dimensions the instanton describes the nucleation of a Ramond-Ramond magnetically charged six-brane in type IIA string theory. We also find static solutions describing spherical charged $p$-branes or fundamental strings held in unstable equilibrium in appropriate background fields. Instabilities of intersecting magnetic fluxbranes are also discussed.

title: Microstates of a neutral black hole in M theory.
abstract: We consider vacuum solutions in M theory of the form of a five-dimensional Kaluza-Klein black hole cross T6. In a certain limit, these include the five-dimensional neutral rotating black hole (cross T6). From a type-IIA standpoint, these solutions carry D0 and D6 charges. We show that there is a simple D-brane description which precisely reproduces the Hawking-Bekenstein entropy in the extremal limit, even though supersymmetry is completely broken.

title: Photoemission “experiments” on holographic superconductors
abstract: We study the effects of a superconducting condensate on holographic Fermi surfaces. With a suitable coupling between the fermion and the condensate, there are stable quasiparticles with a gap. We find some similarities with the phenomenology of the cuprates: in systems whose normal state is a non-Fermi liquid with no stable quasiparticles, a stable quasiparticle peak appears in the condensed phase.

title: Where is the information stored in black holes
abstract: It is shown that many modes of the gravitational field exist only inside the horizon of an extreme black hole in string theory. At least in certain cases, the number of such modes is sufficient to account for the Bekenstein-Hawking entropy. These modes are associated with sources which carry Ramond-Ramond charge, and so may be viewed as the strong coupling limit of D-branes. Although these sources naturally live at the singularity, they are well defined and generate modes which extend out to the horizon. This suggests that the information in an extreme black hole is not localized near the singularity or the horizon, but extends between them.

title: Origin of gauge invariance in string theory.
abstract: We present a first quantization of the space-time embedding X/sup ..mu../ and the world-sheet metric rho of the open bosonic string. The world-sheet metric rho decouples from S-matrix elements in 26 dimensions. This formulation of the theory naturally includes 26-dimensional gauge transformations. The gauge invariance of S-matrix elements is a direct consequence of the decoupling of rho. Second quantization leads to a string field Phichemically bondX/sup ..mu../,rhochemically bond with a gauge-covariant equation of motion.

title: Pair creation of extremal black holes and Kaluza-Klein monopoles.
abstract: Classical solutions describing charged dilaton black holes accelerating in a background magnetic field have recently been found. They include the Ernst metric of the Einstein-Maxwell theory as a special case. We study the extremal limit of these solutions in detail, both at the classical and quantum levels. It is shown that near the event horizon the extremal solutions reduce precisely to the static extremal black hole solutions. For a particular value of the dilaton coupling, these extremal black holes are five-dimensional Kaluza-Klein monopoles. The Euclidean sections of these solutions can be interpreted as instantons describing the pair creation of extremal black holes and/or Kaluza-Klein monopoles in a magnetic field. The action of these instantons is calculated and found to agree with the Schwinger result in the weak-field limit. For the Euclidean Ernst solution, the action for the extremal solution differs from that of the previously discussed wormhole instanton by the Bekenstein-Hawking entropy. However, in many cases quantum corrections become large in the vicinity of the black hole, and the precise description of the creation process is unknown.

title: Parity-violating quasielastic electron scattering.
abstract: The parity-violating asymmetry [ital A] is calculated for quasielastic electron scattering. We use a relativistic mean field model of the nuclear matter response. A Lorentz scalar mean field (which reduces the nucleon's mass) decreases [vert bar][ital A][vert bar] by a relatively large amount. This effect must be understood before information on strange quark contributions or weak axial currents can be extracted. Alternatively, very interesting information on isoscalar convection currents could be obtained.

title: Density dependence of nuclear neutrino-pair production.
abstract: Nuclear decay via neutrino-pair production is found to have a large density dependence because of intermediate electromagnetic couplings to electrons. These are calculated in a relativistic random phase approximation. The decay rate for vector (Fermi) transitions producing electron type neutrino pairs can be enhanced by 10{sup 5} or more at densities relevant for stellar collapse. Axial-vector (Gamow-Teller) transitions are not enhanced.

title: Microscopic relativistic description of proton-nucleus scattering.
abstract: Microscopic relativistic optical potentials have been calculated for closed shell nuclei at energies near 200 MeV. These calculations go beyond the simple RIA by resolving ambiguities in the relativistic NN amplitudes and including Pauli blocking corrections.

title: Quasielastic proton-nucleus scattering in a relativistic plane-wave impulse approximation.
abstract: Proton-nucleus quasielastic scattering cross sections and spin observables are calculated in a relativistic plane-wave impulse approximation for nuclei from $^{12}\mathrm{C}$ to $^{208}\mathrm{Pb}$ at energies of 300 to 800 MeV. Relativistic effects are incorporated by using Dirac spinors with enhanced lower components characterized by an effective mass from 0.8 to 0.9M. The analyzing power is found to decrease significantly from free NN values when relativistic spinors are used. This reduction is in good agreement with data. Little change in polarization transfer coefficients ${D}_{i\mathcal{'}j}$ is found at 500 MeV. However, predictions of enhanced ${D}_{s\mathcal{'}s}$ and ${D}_{l\mathcal{'}l}$ are made at lower energies. Calculations are also presented for (p,n) quasifree charge exchange reactions. Here the analyzing power is almost unchanged but large changes in cross section and polarization transfer coefficients are possible. These changes depend on how pion contributions to the NN amplitudes are treated. Suggestions for future theoretical and experimental work are made.

title: Dynamical color correlations in a SU(2)c quark exchange model of nuclear matter.
abstract: The quark exchange model is a simple realization of an adiabatic approximation to the strong-coupling limit of quantum chromodynamics: the quarks always coalesce into the lowest energy set of flux tubes. Nuclear matter is thus modeled in terms of its quarks. We wish to study the correlations imposed by total wave-function antisymmetry when color degrees of freedom are included. To begin with, we have considered one-dimensional matter with a SU(2) color internal degree of freedom only. We proceed by constructing a totally antisymmetric, color singlet [ital Ansatz] characterized by a variational parameter [lambda] (which describes the length scale over which two quarks in the system are clustered into hadrons) and by performing a variational Monte Carlo calculation of the energy to optimize [lambda] for a fixed density. We calculate the [ital q]-[ital q] correlation function as well, and discuss the qualitative differences between the system at low and high density.