The Flux Tube Model: Applications, Tests, and Extensions

A review and critique of the Isgur-Paton flux tube model of hadronic physics is presented. This entails a detailed comparison with recent lattice gauge theory results which exposes both the successes and shortcomings of the model. Applications to hybrid masses, meson and hybrid meson decays, hadronic charge radii, the spin-orbit force, baryonic hybrids, and hybrid photocouplings are also discussed. Finally, I comment on the issue of adiabatic surface crossing which appears in both the flux tube model and lattice studies.