A low ${\alpha }_s$ and its consequences for unified model building

Abstract

We review various ways of obtaining consistency between the idea of supersymmetric grand unification and an apparent low value of ${\alpha }_s\sim 0.112$ indicated by several low energy experiments. We argue that to reconcile the low value of ${\alpha }_s$ with the predictions of supersymmetric GUTs, we need to go beyond the standard minimal supersymmetric GUT scenario and invoke new physics either at $10^{11}-10^{12}$ GeV, or at the GUT scale.

Comments: LaTeX with epsf style, 20 pages, three (uuencoded) figures