In the gauge/string duality, Wilson loop operators are dual to
open string minimal surfaces anchored on the loop at the boundary of AdS.
In the simplest example, a circular Wilson loop corresponds
to an open string worldsheet with AdS2 geometry. The scattering amplitudes
of the worldsheet fluctuations are holographically dual to one-dimensional
correlation functions in the defect CFT associated with the Wilson line.
I will give an overview of recent progress on this system.
The results have applications in various contexts, such as
the conformal bootstrap, integrability, the g-theorem for
defect RG flows, and chaotic behavior of out-of-time order correlators.