Geometry of Yang-Mills Fields

Atiyah, Michael F.

ISBN 10: 8876423036 / ISBN 13: 9788876423031

Published by Edizioni della Normale, Pisa, Italy

About this Item

1978 softcover 1st edition in gray wraps printed in Pisa. Fair condition. Light to moderate staining to the front and bottom edges of the text block. Former owner's name is printed on the front cover. The books is slightly warped. The binding is tight. Stamped edges of text block. The interior pages are unmarked; although there is some light staining near the spine at the hinges. USPS electronic tracking number issued free of charge. These Lecture Notes are an expanded version of the Fermi Lectures I gave at Scuola Normale Superiore in Pisa, the Loeb Lectures at Harvard and the Whittemore Lectures at Yale, in 1978. In all cases I was addressing a mixed audience of mathematicians and physicists and the presentation had to be tailored accordingly. Throughout, I presented the mathematical material in a somewhat unorthodox order, following a pattern which I felt would relate the new techniques to familiar ground for physicists. The main new results presented in the lectures, namely the construction of all multi-istanton solutions of Yang-Mills fields, is the culmination of several years of fruitful interaction between many physicists and mathematicians. The major breakthrough came with the observation by Ward that the complex methods developed by Penrose in his twistor programme were ideally suited to the study of the Yang-Mills equations. The instanton problem was then seen to be equivalent to a problem in complex analysis and to one in algebraic geometry. Using the powerful methods of modern algebraic geometry it was not long before the problem was finally solved.

Seller Inventory # 11896

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Geometry of Yang-Mills Fields
• Publisher: Edizioni della Normale, Pisa, Italy
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 8876423036
• ISBN 13: 9788876423031
• Binding: Softcover
• Edition: First Edition.
• Condition: Fair
• Dust Jacket Condition: No Jacket

About this title

Synopsis

These Lecture Notes are an expanded version of the Fermi Lectures I gave at Scuola Normale Superiore in Pisa, the Loeb Lectures at Harvard and the Whittemore Lectures at Yale, in 1978. In all cases I was addressing a mixed audience of mathematicians and physicists and the presentation had to be tailored accordingly. Throughout, I presented the mathematical material in a somewhat unorthodox order, following a pattern which I felt would relate the new techniques to familiar ground for physicists. The main new results presented in the lectures, namely the construction of all multi-istanton solutions of Yang-Mills fields, is the culmination of several years of fruitful interaction between many physicists and mathematicians.The major breakthrough came with the observation by Ward that the complex methods developed by Penrose in his 'twistor programme' were ideally suited to the study of the Yang-Mills equations. The instanton problem was then seen to be equivalent to a problem in complex analysis and to one in algebraic geometry. Using the powerful methods of modern algebraic geometry it was not long before the problem was finally solved.