Symplectic Invariants and Hamiltonian Dynamics (Birkhauser Advanced Texts / Basler Lehrbucher) - Hardcover

Hofer, Helmut; Zehnder, Eduard

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 3764350660 ISBN 13: 9783764350666

Publisher: Birkhauser Verlag AG, 1994

Synopsis

Analysis of an old variational principal in classical mechanics has established global periodic phenomena in Hamiltonian systems. One of the links is a class of sympletic invariants, called sympletic capacities, and these invariants are the main theme of this book. Topics covered include basic sympletic geometry, sympletic capacities and rigidity, sympletic fixed point theory, and a survey on Floer homology and sympletic homology.

About this title

Review

From the reviews:

“Symplectic Invariants and Hamiltonian Dynamics is obviously a work of central importance in the field and is required reading for all would-be players in this game. Happily, it is very well written and sports a lot of very useful commentary by the authors; the sections introducing the individual chapters are particularly well done ... . It is all fine scholarship in an exciting and fertile area.” (Michael Berg, The Mathematical Association of America, June, 2011)

From the Back Cover

The discoveries of the last decades have opened new perspectives for the old field of Hamiltonian systems and led to the creation of a new field: symplectic topology. Surprising rigidity phenomena demonstrate that the nature of symplectic mappings is very different from that of volume preserving mappings. This raises new questions, many of them still unanswered. On the other hand, analysis of an old variational principle in classical mechanics has established global periodic phenomena in Hamiltonian systems. As it turns out, these seemingly different phenomena are mysteriously related. One of the links is a class of symplectic invariants, called symplectic capacities. These invariants are the main theme of this book, which includes such topics as basic symplectic geometry, symplectic capacities and rigidity, periodic orbits for Hamiltonian systems and the action principle, a bi-invariant metric on the symplectic diffeomorphism group and its geometry, symplectic fixed point theory, the Arnold conjectures and first order elliptic systems, and finally a survey on Floer homology and symplectic homology.

The exposition is self-contained and addressed to researchers and students from the graduate level onwards.

 

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All the chapters have a nice introduction with the historic development of the subject and with a perfect description of the state of the art. The main ideas are brightly exposed throughout the book. (...) This book, written by two experienced researchers, will certainly fill in a gap in the theory of symplectic topology. The authors have taken part in the development of such a theory by themselves or by their collaboration with other outstanding people in the area.

(Zentralblatt MATH)

 

This book is a beautiful introduction to one outlook on the exciting new developments of the last ten to fifteen years in symplectic geometry, or symplectic topology, as certain aspects of the subject are lately called. (...) The authors are obvious masters of the field, and their reflections here and there throughout the book on the ambient literature and open problems are perhaps the most interesting parts of the volume.

(Matematica)

Edition details

• Publisher: Birkhauser Verlag AG
• Publication date: 1994
• ISBN 10: 3764350660
• ISBN 13: 9783764350666
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 356