edited by Antonino Zichichi (European Physical Society, Geneva, Switzerland)

From August to September 1998, a group of 75 physicists from 52 laboratories in 15 countries met in Erice, Italy, for the 36th Course of the International School of Subnuclear Physics. This book constitutes the proceedings of that meeting. It reviews the present status of subnuclear physics and its connections with the fundamental problems of physics, such as the unification of all gauge forces.

• Opening Lecture (E Witten)
• Hot Topics (G G Ross, H Fritzsch, G M Shore, E V Shuryak, D Kharzeev, M Koshiba, S L Glashow)
• HEP from the QCD to the GUT Scale (G 't Hooft, R Barbieri, G Giudice, E Rabinovici, R Kenway)
• Gravity and Cosmology: Towards the Hubble Radius (K Skenderis)
• Are There Alternatives to Standard Inflation? (N Turok, G Veneziano)
• The Glorious Days of Physics (G 't Hooft)
• Reports (U F Becker, A Wagner, A Bettini)
• Future (B H Wiik, A Zichichi)
• Special Sessions for New Talents (M Blasone, D Enström, D Holtmannspötter, A Kempf, S Mele, T Montaruli, A Quadt, A Sinkovics, A Werthenbach)
• Closing Lecture (L D Faddeev)