  Planck scale physics represents a future challenge, located between particle
physics and general relativity. The Planck scale marks a threshold beyond which
the old description of spacetime breaks down and conceptually new phenomena
must appear. Little is known about the fundamental theory valid at Planckian
energies, except that it necessarily seems to imply the occurrence of a minimal
length scale, providing a natural ultraviolet cutoff and a limit to the
possible resolution of spacetime.
  Motivated by String Theory, the models of large extra dimensions lower the
Planck scale to values soon accessible. These models predict a vast number of
quantum gravity effects at the lowered Planck scale, among them the production
of TeV-mass black holes and gravitons. Within the extra dimensional scenario,
also the minimal length comes into the reach of experiment and sets a
fundamental limit to short distance physics.
  We review the status of Planck scale physics in these effective models.
