Supersymmetry breaking and an introduction to grand unified theories

Particle Physics 3: Supersymmetry and Grand Unification (Spring, 2010)

Lecture Playlist

  1. Renormalization concepts, and dimensional analysis

  2. Fermions and bosons

  3. Propagators and renormalization of mass

  4. Symmetry and Grassmann numbers

  5. A first supersymmetric model

  6. Supersymmetry building blocks

  7. Lagrangians that preserve supersymmetry

  8. Generalizing supersymmetry to 3+1 spacetime, and QFT

  9. Supersymmetry breaking and an introduction to grand unified theories

  10. GUTs, the SU(5) representation, proton decay

May 31, 2010

In the first half of the lecture, Professor Susskind makes an analogy between breaking supersymmetry and breaking the symmetry of a ferromagnet.   In the second half of the lecture, Professor Susskind introduces GUTs as corresponding to the group SU(5) which has the subgroup SU(3)xSU(2)xSU(1) corresponding to the Standard Model.

Topics: 
  • Supersymmetry breaking and Goldstone bosons
  • GUTs and generators of SU(5)
  • Connecting generators to particles