TY - JOUR TI - Phases of supersymmetric gauge theories and galois invariants DO - https://doi.org/doi:10.7282/T3ZS2X0N PY - 2007 AB - This thesis deals with the problem of understanding the vacuum structure of supersymmetric gauge theories. More precisely, the theories considered here are N = 1 supersymmetric gauge theories obtained through breaking of part of the supersymmetry from N = 2 gauge theories. The space of vacua of these theories has a very interesting and rich structure, only partly understood. This work proposes a new point of view on this problem, conjecturing a relation between the classification of certain special phases of N = 1 supersymmetric gauge theories and the mathematical problem of classifying a certain kind of graphs - Grothendieck's "dessins s'enfants" - according to the corresponding Galois invariants. The Seiberg-Witten solution of the parent N = 2 theory plays a crucial role in establishing this correspondence. KW - Physics and Astronomy KW - Gauge fields (Physics) KW - Symmetry (Physics) KW - Group theory KW - Grand unified theories (Nuclear physics) KW - Supersymmetry LA - English ER -