Student Presenter(s): Patrick Mazza
Faculty Mentor: Sophia Domokos
Department: Physics
School/College: College of Arts and Sciences, New York City

The traits of subatomic particles like protons and neutrons are very difficult to describe from first principles, because their constituent parts interact so frequently and forcefully that we cannot keep track of them. This research focuses on providing insight into an alternative method for understanding the behavior of subatomic particles: holographic duality, a concept derived from string theory. Holographic duality is based on the idea that our world is a lower dimensional "hologram" of a higher dimensional universe, in which the behavior of subatomic particles is easier to understand. We use holographic duality to make predictions for the masses of particles called mesons, which we then compare to experimental data.