Petnica Summer Institute

Summer School on String Theory and
Summer School on Gravitational Waves
31 July - 10 August, 2025

On the theory and phenomenology tracks of PSI, we are organizing two schools in parallel—one on String Theory and the other on Gravitational Waves.

The aim: The schools aim to provide intensive and thorough courses on a broad range of topics in the fields of string theory and gravitational waves. The schools will not be limited to lectures but will also include daily discussion sessions, problem-solving, and independent work.

For whom: The school is intended for early graduate (MSc / junior PhD) students from all around the world. We will also consider motivated applications from senior undergraduates, as well as more senior PhD students. Students from the Balkans region/Southeast Europe are especially encouraged to apply.

By whom: Lectures will be given by postdocs and senior researchers, while problem-solving sessions and project work will be tutored by senior PhD students. The lecturers will come from various European institutions.


String Theory

Topics

  • Why String Theory?
  • Bosonic Strings
  • Conformal Field Theory
  • String Interactions
  • D-branes
  • AdS/CFT
  • Black Holes in String Theory

Lecturers

  • Jose Calderon-Infante (CERN)
  • Mihailo Čubrović (IPB, Belgrade)
  • Vladan Đukić (IPB, Belgrade)
  • Maurizio Firrotta (University of Crete)
  • Alessandra Gnecchi (INFN, Padua)
  • Ruben Monten (CERN)
  • Danijel Obrić (IPB, Belgrade)
  • Matthew Roberts (University of Iceland)
  • Marko Simonović (University of Florence)
  • Marija Tomašević (University of Amsterdam)

Gravitational Waves

Topics

  • Review of General Relativity
  • Black Holes
  • Compact Objects
  • GW Detection, Data Analysis and Astrophysics
  • Cosmological Sources of GWs
  • BH Perturbation Theory
  • Effective Field Theory Methods in GW Physics

Lecturers

  • Enrico Barausse (SISSA, Trieste)
  • Mateja Bošković (DESY, Hamburg)
  • Branislav Cvetković (IPB, Belgrade)
  • Daniel Figueroa (IFIC, Valencia)
  • Rafael Porto (DESY, Hamburg)
  • Borna Salehian (ETH, Zürich)
  • Nikola Savić (IPhT, Saclay)