Summary: | A dissertation submitted to the University of the Witwatersrand, Faculty of Science in
ful lment of the academic requirements of the degree of Master of Science.
Johannesburg, 2015. === The gauge/gravity correspondence is a conjectured exact duality between quantum eld
theories and theories of quantum gravity. A very simple gauge/string duality, claims an
equivalence between the Gaussian matrix model and the topological A-model string theory
on P1. In this dissertation we study this duality, proposing concrete operators in the
matrix model that are dual to gravitational descendants of the puncture operator of the
topological string theory. We test our proposal by showing that a large number of matrix
model correlators are in complete agreement with correlators in the dual topological
string theory. Contact term interactions, as proposed by Gopakumar and Pius, play an
interesting and non-trivial role in the duality.
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