Formation of singularities in Yang-Mills equations

Abstract

This is a survey of recent studies of singularity formation in solutions of spherically symmetric Yang-Mills equations in higher dimensions. The main attention is focused on five space dimensions because this case exhibits interesting similarities with Einstein's equations in the physical dimension, in particular the dynamics at the threshold of singularity formation shares many features (such as universality, self-similarity, and scaling) with critical phenomena in gravitational collapse. The borderline case of four space dimensions is also analyzed and the formation of singularities is shown to be intimately tied to the existence of the instanton solution.