Overview & Welcome

At the "Duke's Office", Castle Ringberg (2009)

Hi there! This is the homepage of Benjamin Jurke. This page gives you the opportunity to find some basic information about me and how to contact me.

I'm currently working on my PhD in theoretical high energy physics at the Max-Planck-Institut für Physik in Munich (Germany).

My interests and work focus on the topic of quantum gravity and high energy particle physics - particularly in the context of string theory - and the general interplay between geometry, topology and physics. String theory is a branch of mathematical physics still under development and is in its original form based upon the idea of one-dimensional extended objects, which are called strings. In fact, nowadays string theory should be rather called "brane theory" as it contains any kind of higher dimensional membranes. This approach of using extended objects takes care of many problems encountered in the point particle based quantum field theories, e.g. the well-established Standard Model of particle physics. While mathematical self-consistency specifies certain parts of the theory almost uniquely, the dimensional compactification, which is necessary to make contact with our four-dimensional world, yields an entire landscape of possible vacua with no obvious method to point out the right one. Another issue is the fact that our current theoretical understanding of string theory itself is somewhat limited, as we only have an perturbative (read: "approximative") understanding whereas the non-perturbative "full" theory still remains unknown. However, lacking any experimental verification it remains yet to determine how far string theory will alter our perception of reality in the long run...

Aside from my academic work I've great interest in most other technical subjects, in particular areas related to computer science & programming, astronomy and space exploration.

Bielefeld 2006...

...and in 2007

Prior occupations:

So far I completed my undergraduate studies of Physics and Mathematics at the University of Bielefeld, Germany. In my physics diploma (the German equivalent to a M.Sc.) in theoretical physics I reviewed the classical methods of space-time compactification in heterotic string theory and delved deeper into related mathematical properties. A diploma in pure mathematics dealt with the dimensional reduction of higher-dimensional instantons on spaces with exceptional geometry.

Right now - enroute to a PhD degree in theoretical physics - I'm working on Type-IIB and F-theory GUT model building, see the "Academic Work" page for more information.