PROFESSOR RAJESH GOPAKUMAR

String theory has evolved into a powerful framework which is capable of providing fresh insights into well established frameworks like quantum field theory (QFT). One such set of new perspectives have been on conformal field theories (CFTs) which are central to our understanding of QFTs. This talk will be centered on some very "down-to-earth CFTs" such as the Wilson-Fisher fixed point (and its analogues and generalisations) that governs critical phenomena in statistical mechanics. We will aim to bring out the utility as well as beauty of the new angles that string theory methods bring to these well studied systems.