It is reviewed how Compton scattering sum rules relate low-energy nucleon
structure quantities to the nucleon excitation spectrum. In particular, the GDH
sum rule and recently proposed extensions of it will be discussed. These
extensions are sometimes more calculationally robust, which may be an advantage
when estimating the chiral extrapolations of lattice QCD results, such as for
anomalous magnetic moments. Subsequently, new developments in our description
of the nucleon excitation spectrum will be discussed, in particular a recently
developed chiral effective field theory framework for the
Δ(1232)-resonance region. Within this framework, we discuss results on
N and Δ masses, the γNΔ transition and the Δ
magnetic dipole moment.Comment: 10 pages, prepared for proceedings of Symposium on 20 Years of
Physics at the Mainz Mikrotro