Mithat Ünsal's webpage

I am a quantum field theorist.   I mostly work on dynamics of gauge theories with applications to QCD, theoretical  lattice field theory and mathematical physics.   My  general interests are

• Gauge theory dynamics and its applications
• Resurgence theory, applications to QFT and quantum mechanics
• Interrelations of large-orders in perturbation theory and topological configurations
• QCD,  QCD-like  and chiral theories
• Supersymmetry on lattice, lattice gauge theory
• Large-N   volume independence, Eguchi-Kawai reduction, orbifold-orientifold equivalences,
• Thermal field theory, hot QCD
• Supersymmetric gauge dynamics and supersymmetry breaking
• Classification of topological  excitations (magnetic monopoles, charged and neutral bions, semi-classical renormalons) and confinement mechanisms.
• Gauge/string dualities, string theory,  D-branes, topological field theories

My research is motivated by physical problems in gauge theories, as opposed to particular techniques. Due to this reason, besides borrowing recent techniques from supersymmetry, string/D-brane theory, and lattice field theory, I have also developed a variety of new field theoretic ideas and methods.

These methods provide new insights into the microscopic mechanisms of confinement, chiral symmetry breaking  and deconfinement phase transition in non-supersymmetric gauge theories. They also provide   a firmer microscopic   understanding of the physics that yields the known exact results of supersymmetric QCD.

You can see my  papers at  HEP-INSPIRE: Publications

Recently,  I have been  working on applications of Resuregence theory and trans-series  to quantum mechanics and quantum field theory.  I hope to continue to work on this program in the upcoming many years. The goal of this program is to provide a rigorous definition of quantum field theory with practical utility,  and to provide a useful framework to study interesting non-perturbative problems. This class of problems are not fashionable, most of them are deserted in early 80’s not because they are unimportant or irrelevant,  rather  useful analytical approaches were not found, and probably other reasons as well.   I believe that the notion of resurgence (developed primarily by French mathematician Jean Ecalle) and  the physical principle of  continuity will resolve most of the deep issues about QFTs in the upcoming few years.  Small  steps in this direction are undertaken in my recent work with Argyres and Dunne.  Here is  a recent talk I have given resurgence in QFT.

 

February 2014: My collaborator Gerald Dunne gave some lecture on applications of  resurgence at CERN winter School. You can find them here. At the end of the  lecture, there is an list of mathematics and physics references on the topic.  dunne-cern-winter-2014-lectures 

By the end of March 2014, I am also giving four lectures with similar content (with slightly different applications) at Kobayashi-Maskawa Institute, at Nagoya University.

Here is a very nice talk by Ricardo Schiappa given at CERN  Schiappa-Resurgent transseries

 

Below is a photo of mine (Photo courtesy of Brad Plummer, SLAC), in front of a blackboard. In the background, there is a cartoon of  my most favorite topological excitations,  monopole-instantons and magnetic bions.

.

The picture was taken in the GreenRoom at SLAC.

Contact:

• unsal.mithat_at_gmail.com
• (replace _at_ with @)