MIT OpenCourseWare
String Theory
- Instructor
- Prof. John McGreevy
- Term
- Fall 2008
- Level
- Graduate
- What's inside
- 6 problem sets · 5 solutions · 1 lecture note · 1 reading · 27 other files · 5 web pages
- Materials open
- MIT OCW
Other versions of this course
- 8.821 · Fall 2014 · Study here
- 8.821 · Fall 2008 · Study here (this version)
About this course
Source: MIT OpenCourseWare 8.821 String Theory, Fall 2008, Prof. John McGreevy — original course page on ocw.mit.edu ↗. License: CC BY-NC-SA 4.0. Study order: none is claimed; materials are grouped by MIT's own sections. Taken from MIT's published course files, downloaded from ocw.mit.edu on September 23, 2026. How RedLectern is built.
Materials are grouped the way MIT organized them. A verified, course-wide order has not been established here.
Has MIT solutions
Before you start
Prerequisites are not listed here. Check MIT's own syllabus for this course.
How this course was organized
What's here, and what isn't
- MIT lists a session calendar for this course, but it could not be verified well enough to build a sequence from it — materials are grouped by section instead.
Not included here
42 items from the source could not be safely included:
- MIT's page format for this item wasn't recognized clearly enough to place it safely. (41 items)
- Referenced in a table, but without MIT's own verified order, so it isn't used to claim a sequence.
Materials by section
Grouped by section, as MIT organized them. Not sequenced or ordered.
Lecture Notes
25 files
- Lecture 01: What you need to know about string theory Download
- Lecture 02: String theory summary continued Download
- Lecture 03: The decoupling argument; AdS/CFT without string theory, a discovery with hindsight Download
- Lecture 04 Download
- Lecture 5: SUSY Self-Defense Download
- Lecture 06: Supersymmetric Lagrangians and Basic Checks of AdS/CFT Download
- Lecture 07 Preview of AdS–CFT Correspondence; String Theory from Gauge Fields; and t’ Hooft Counting Download
- Lecture 8: Large N Counting Download
- Lecture 09: Preview of Strings in N = 4 SYM; Hierarchy of Scaling dimensions; Conformal Symmetry in QFT Download
- Lecture 10: CFTs in D > 2 Download
- Lecture 11: CFT continued; geometry of AdS Download
- Lecture 12: Boundary of AdS (cont.); Poincaré patch; wave equation in AdS Download
- Lecture 13: Masses of fields and dimensions of operators Download
- Lecture 14: Wave equation in AdS, Green’s function Download
- Lecture 15: 2-Point Functions in P-space; Introduction to 3-Point Functions Download
- Lecture 16: Correlators of more than two operators Download
- Lecture 17: More on 3-point functions, the chiral anomaly, and Wilson loops Download
- Lecture 18: Wilson Loops Download
- Lecture 19 Download
- Lecture 20: The Wider World of Gauge/Gravity Duality Download
- Lecture 21: Confinement, continued Download
- Lecture 22: Black Hole Mechanics is Thermodynamics Download
- Lecture 23: Black Hole Thermodynamics Download
- Lecture 24: Blackhole Thermodynamics (Con’d) Download
- Lecture 25: Thermal aspects of N = 4 SYM Download
Assignments
12 files
- Problem Set 1 Download
- Problem Set 1 Solutions Download
- Problem Set 2 Download
- Problem Set 2 Solutions Download
- Problem Set 3 Download
- Problem Set 3 Solutions Download
- Problem Set 4 Download
- Problem Set 4 Solutions Download
- Problem Set 5 Download
- Problem Set 5 Solutions Download
- Problem Set 6 Download
- Curvature Template Download
Projects
MIT OpenCourseWare, Prof. John McGreevy, 8.821 String Theory, Fall 2008.
License: CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 · Edition: Fall 2008 · Open the original course on OCW ↗
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