atter (quarks and leptons) in a mathematically complete system. On the other hand, many detractors criticise string theory because it has not yet provided experimentally testable predictions. Like any other quantum theory of gravity, it is widely believed that testing the theory experimentally would be prohibitively expensive, requiring heroic feats of engineering on a solar-system scale. Although string theory, like any other scientific theory, is falsifiable in principle, critics maintain that it is unfalsifiable for the foreseeable future, and so should not be called science. Work on string theory is made interesting because of the mathematics involved, and because of the large number of forms that the theories can take. String theory strongly suggests that spacetime has eleven dimensions [2], not the usual three space and one time; but the theory can easily describe universes with four observable spacetime dimensions too.[3] String theories include objects more general than strings, called branes. These are black-holes charged with a differential form vector potential which has more than one index, a different type of electricity and magnetism where the fundamental objects are extended. By studying certain p-branes and identifying them with D-branes, endpoints for strings, certain types of string theory are shown to be equivalent to certain types of more traditional gauge theory. Research on this equivalence has led to new insights on quantum chromodynamics, the fundamental theory of the strong nuclear force We live in a wonderfully complex universe, and we are curious about it by nature. Time and again we have wondered--- why are we here? Where did we and the world come from? What is the world made of? It is our privilege to live in a time when enormous progress has been made towards finding some of the answers. String theory is our most recent attempt to answer the last (and part of the second) question. So, what is the world made of? Ordinary matter is made of atoms, which are in turn made of just three basic components: electrons whirling around a nucleus composed of neutrons and protons. The electron is a truly fundamental particle (it is one of a family of particles known as leptons), but neutrons and protons are made of smaller particles, known as quarks. Quarks are, as far as we know, truly elementary. Our current knowledge about the subatomic composition of the universe is summarized in what is known as the Standard Model of particle physics. It describes both the fundamental building blocks out of which the world is made, and the forces through which these blocks interact. There are twelve bas