The tendency in theoretical physics, particularly in the past few decades, has been towards unification: over the years it has emerged that increasingly many physical phenomena can be explained by a common underlying theory. Symmetry principles, both global and local, play an important role in this unification programme. Global symmetries often account for approximate regularities we observe in nature - local or gauge symmetries are understood as basic symmetries which lie at the heart of the interactions of the constituents of matter.
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