Chapter 652 I Have Doubts

Oxford University Lecture Hall.

The audience was crowded and there were no empty seats.

The scholars sitting at the table were either communicating in low voices, or flipping through the papers and report meeting minutes in their hands...

Those chaotic and noisy voices, like a beautiful piece of music, are so pleasant to Professor Brian Carroll's ears. In half an hour, he will be one of the greatest mathematical physicists of this century, put the last brick on the edifice of the Millennium Puzzle of the Young-Mills Equation, and share a million dollars... at least three points part of one.

For scholars who do theoretical work, this bonus is already quite a lot.

Of course, his motivation for solving this problem is not a bonus, at least in his opinion, money and honor are incidentals.

how to say?

Pushing civilization forward with one's own hands is a joyful thing in itself.

Fifteen minutes are left before the report meeting, and the participating scholars have basically arrived, and those who have not yet appeared probably will not come. The security guard standing at the entrance of the lecture hall opened the isolation zone, and began to selectively let in some masters, doctors, and post-doctoral scholars who were waiting outside the lecture hall and had not received invitation letters to enter the auditorium.

Standing in the corridor next to the venue, Professor Brian, who was wearing a black formal suit, glanced at his watch, then cast his gaze in the direction of the venue, with a trace of disappointment in his eyes.

At this time, a waiter in a black suit and a bow tie came over.

With a heartbeat, Professor Brian immediately looked at the waiter and asked.

"Is Professor Lu here?"

The receptionist was slightly stunned, then shook his head and said, "No."

Hearing that Lu Zhou didn't come, the disappointment in Professor Brian's eyes became even stronger.

But that's all.

Although it is a pity that Professor Lu did not appear here, there are not too few big cows who came to listen to this report. No matter whether Professor Lu is optimistic about his research or not, his report will continue as usual.

Fifteen minutes passed, and the report meeting officially began.

Walking to the stage, Brian showed his PPT on the curtain, and began to elaborate on his thinking on the quality gap problem from the abstract of the paper, as well as some methods used in the proof.

Sitting under the stage, Luo Wenxuan took a deep breath and spread the notebook on his lap.

Above is a list of several problems he discovered while studying the Yang-Mills equation and Professor Bryan's thesis. It would be best if these problems could be answered in the report. If not, he will point it out during the Q&A session.

On the other side, Peter Goddard from Princeton sat with Edward Witten.

Both of them are masters in the field of mathematical physics, and they are mainly engaged in the research of string theory. When they heard that Professor Bryan of Oxford University claimed to have solved the mass gap problem, the two who happened to be visiting CERN immediately hit it off and flew to the UK.

Listening to Professor Brian's narration on the stage, Dean Goddard suddenly sighed with regret.

"It would be nice if Professor Lu was here."

As the dean of the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, when Lu Zhou submitted his resignation to him, he tried to retain this promising scholar, but it was a pity that he failed in the end. No matter how many times he thought about it, he would inevitably feel a little regretful.

"He has his difficulties," Witten smiled, crossing his legs and resting his notebook on his lap, "and whether he's here or not, I'm sure as an expert in the field, he won't Miss this briefing."

Goddard: "What do you think of Professor Brian's thesis?"

Witten thought for a while and said: "I need to think about it for a while. After all, he has revised it at least ten times since the release of the preprint. I didn't see the final official version until a week ago. What is worthy of recognition is his proof idea. There are things to commend, but I always feel that there is something wrong. If Mathematical Physics intends to invite me as a reviewer, then I will write my opinion in the review comments... What do you think?"

Before the report meeting, Professor Bryan has publicly stated that he will submit the finalized paper to Mathematical Physics. If there is no accident, for such a major proposition, "Mathematical Physics" will organize a jury of at least five people to conduct the most rigorous review of the paper.

As a top mathematical physicist who has won the Fields Medal, "Mathematical Physics" will obviously not miss Witten's name.

Of course, Peter Goddard, who was sitting next to him, was the same.

Regarding the question thrown by Professor Witten, Dean Goddard was silent for a while before speaking.

"I feel similar to you that his proof may be flawed...and, do I have another opinion on the matter?"

Witten raised his eyebrows: "Oh?"

Goddard tapped four points on his notebook with a ballpoint pen, and drew two lines: "A four-dimensional gauge field theory with SU(N) or SO(N) and SP(N) as the gauge group may be Equivalent to a string theory with 1/n as the string coupling constant...if this is the case, both the mass gap and the quark confinement phenomenon can be perfectly explained."

Witten raised his eyebrows with interest: "From the perspective of string theory?"

Goddard looked sideways at him and nodded: "Exactly."

Witten said with a smile: "Your point of view has successfully aroused my interest. Maybe after the report is over, we can go to a nearby coffee shop for a drink together."

Goddard smiled and said, "Haha, if you ask me."

While exchanging this new idea of ​​proof, the two of them didn't realize it. In the bottom of their hearts, they had already given up any hope for this report meeting.

Two hours passed, and the report came to an end.

After Professor Bryan finished the last page, applause broke out in the lecture hall, and the whole lecture also entered the questioning session.

Because he had made sufficient preparations before, Professor Brian answered all the questions raised by the scholars in the audience.

Soon, no one in the lecture hall raised their hands.

Just when Professor Brian was about to announce the end of the report, a hand suddenly stretched out.

"Wait a moment."

Looking at the solitary right hand in the crowd, Professor Brian frowned slightly, but quickly stretched his brows and said in a pleasant manner.

"whats the matter?"

Taking a deep breath, Luo Wenxuan closed the notebook in his hand and stood up.

Sitting on the other side of the lecture hall, looking at the man who stood up, Witten's face suddenly showed surprise.

Noticing this surprised expression, Goddard cast him a questioning look: "Do you know him?"

Staring at Luo Wenxuan standing up with interest, Witten smiled and said, "Of course, he is my student."

Although he has attended the report meeting no less than 20 times, Luo Wenxuan still felt a lot of pressure being stared at by so many famous scholars.

Calm himself down, looking at Professor Brian on the stage, he said.

"I have doubts."

Brian: "Go ahead."

Luo Wenxuan: "On page 11, line 15, I noticed that you used the method of defining the gauge invariant action in the Euclid spacetime of the torus in your paper...is that right?"

Brian raised his chin: "Of course, if we plan to discuss this issue from the regularization of the lattice, this step is crucial to the entire argument process."

"As you said, this step is crucial, but..." Luo Wenxuan took a deep breath and continued, "But how do you plan to prove that the grid step size tends to the zero-time limit?"