Memorial Volume For Stanley Mandelstam


Book Description

Stanley Mandelstam (1928-2016) was one of the most influential and respected particle theorists. Coming as a young chemical engineer from South Africa to study theoretical physics in England, he quickly became a leading physicist in his field. With his deep understanding of quantum field theory, he pioneered the development of the analytic S-matrix theory as well as the path-dependent formulations for quantum gauge theories and for quantum general relativity. They are being actively used for the electroweak theory and having their imprints in lattice gauge theory and loop quantum gravity. Also he elucidated the mechanisms for quark confinement in quantum chromodynamics, constructed non-perturbative bosonization methods in 1+1 dimensions, and proved the perturbative finiteness and β=0 of N=4 supersymmetric Yang-Mills theory. His work also led to the discovery of dual resonance models, which in turn became superstring theory. He was a leader in these developments, devoting much of his later years to the proof that the theory is perturbatively finite so it can be considered as a contender for the theory of quantum gravity.He was also a very modest and friendly man, impressing everyone with his sharp intellect as well as his humanity. This volume contains essays written by many of his friends and students, including both detailed reports on his scientific achievements as well as personal reminiscences. Also collected in the volume are some selected reprints of Mandelstam's early seminal papers and abstracts of selected papers representing the full spectrum of his contributions.




Geoffrey Chew: Architect Of The Bootstrap


Book Description

This special volume is dedicated to Geoffrey Chew who passed away on April 12, 2019, at age 94. He is best known as the architect and passionate champion of the bootstrap concept, sometimes called nuclear democracy. His work influenced generations of particle physicists. His passion for physics was an inspiration for his many students and associates. From the Chew-Low theory for meson-nucleon scattering to Analytic S-Matrix, Regge Poles, and Bootstrap principle, his originality left its mark in ways that continue to the present. With contributions from Chew's former collaborators, students, and friends, the book will cover various facets of his life and impact on physics.Contributors include Steven Weinberg, Steven Frautschi, Gabriele Veneziano, Peter Landshoff, Carl Rosenzweig, Basarab Nicolescu, William Frazer, David Gross, John Schwartz, Ling-Lie Chau, Chung-I Tan, Richard Brower, Carleton DeTar, R Shankar, David Kaiser, Fritjof Capra, and others.




Strings to Strings


Book Description

This book presents the essentials culminating in the effective string theory of flux tubes in meticulous technical and conceptual detail. The book is divided into four parts. Part One provides historical background, while Part Two (consisting of 14 chapters) covers the passage from Heisenberg's S-matrix theory to String Theory. This includes non-perturbative LSZ formalism, dispersion relations, Regge poles, duality and dual resonance models. Part Three offers a comprehensive analysis of QCD, focusing on important concepts like asymptotic freedom and quark confinement. The section also delves into lattice gauge theories and effective descriptions of superconductivity and strong interactions. Part Four, the final two chapters, describe the lattice gauge theory determinations of Yang-Mills flux tubes in three and four dimensions and effective string theories, including their systematic constructions. These chapters provide detailed technical information to help readers, especially students, develop their expertise in these ideas. This book is ideal for graduate students, postdocs, and senior researchers looking to deepen their understanding of effective string theory and related concepts.




Modern Aspects Of Relativity


Book Description

Today, Relativity is becoming an integrated aspect of engineering fields. Its application to the Global Positioning System (GPS), extends in usage from smart watches to the navigation of cars, airplanes (drones) and even autonomous tractors. In rather expensive particle accelerators, physicists are everyday 'playing' with Relativistic Billiards, common to the betatrons of cancer therapy using electrons. Computer programs, such as 'ray tracing' methods, are enhanced to simulate objects in relativistic motion, which now offer us relativistic visualizations of accretion disks around compact, astrophysical objects like Black Holes.Against the backdrop of the applications explained throughout the chapters, this book takes on a practical and intuitive approach in introducing the Lorentz invariance of light propagation and space-time concepts. The book begins with simple mathematics, like the classical Pythagoras formula for energy-momentum 'triangles'. Later, readers will find the intuitive vector calculus reemerging in the expansion of full relativistic expressions. Prepared with instructive diagrams of recent experiments, even the layperson can grasp the essential study of Relativity and marvel at its applications within this book.




Old and New Questions in Physics, Cosmology, Philosophy, and Theoretical Biology


Book Description

Simply to say that this is a collection of essays in honor of the late Wolfgang Yourgrau (1908-1979) is to explain, at least for-the obviously many-"insiders," the unusually wide-ranging title of the present volume. In a Foreword to the Proceedings of the First International Colloquium (focusing on logic, physical reality, and history), held at the University of Denver in May of 1966 under their leadership, Wolfgang Y ourgrau and Allen Breck wrote, in an oblique reference to C. P. Snow: "Indeed there are not two or three or four cultures: there is only one culture; our generation has lost its awareness of this . . . . Historians, logicians, physicists-all are banded in one common enterprise, namely in their des ire to weave an enlightened fabric of human knowledge. " Augment, if you will, the foregoing categories of scholars with biologists, philos ophers, cosmologists, and theologians-all of whom, in addition to historians, Wolf gang Yourgrau, by dint of his inextinguishable enthusiasm and charismatic qualities, assembled in Denver for the Second and Third International Colloquia (in 1967 and 1974, respectively)-and a few other besides, and one arrives at a statement of the credo wh ich Y ourgrau not only professed, but consistently exemplified throughout his adult life.




Journal of the Franklin Institute


Book Description

Vols. 1-69 include more or less complete patent reports of the U. S. Patent Office for years 1825-59. Cf. Index to v. 1-120 of the Journal, p. [415]







The Analytic S-Matrix


Book Description

A theory of the S-Matrix, starting from physically plausible assumptions and looking at the mathematical consequences.




Cultural Amnesia


Book Description

In this book can be heard the merest edge of an enormous conversation. As they never were in life, we can imagine the speakers all gathered in some vast room, wearing name tags in case they don’t recognize each other (although some recognize each other all too well, and avoid contact). My heroes and heroines are here. An almanac combining a comprehensive survey of modern culture with an annotated index of who-was-who and what-was-what, Cultural Amnesia is Clive James’s unique take on the places and the faces that shaped the twentieth-century. From Anna Akhmatova to Stefan Zweig, via Charles de Gaulle, Hitler, Thomas Mann and Wittgenstein, this varied and unfailingly absorbing book is both story and history, both public memoir and personal record – and provides an essential field-guide to the vast movements of taste, intellect, politics and delusion that helped to prepare the times we live in now.




The Posen Library of Jewish Culture and Civilization, Volume 9


Book Description

The Posen Library’s groundbreaking anthology series—called “a feast of Jewish culture, in ten volumes” by the Chronicle of Higher Education—explores in Volume 9 global Jewish responses to the years 1939 to 1973, a time of unprecedented destruction, dislocation, agency, and creativity “An extensive look at Jewish civilization and culture from the eve of World War II to the Yom Kippur War . . . It’s a weighty collection, to be sure, but one that’s consistently engaging . . . An edifying and diverse survey of 20th-century Jewish life.”—Kirkus Reviews, starred review “Readers seeking primary texts, documents, images, and artifacts constituting Jewish culture and civilization will not be disappointed. More important, they might even be inspired. . . . This set will serve to improve teaching and research in Jewish studies at institutions of higher learning and, at the same time, promote, maintain, and improve understanding of the Jewish population and Judaism in general.”—Booklist, starred review The ninth volume of The Posen Library of Jewish Culture and Civilization covers the years 1939 to 1973, a period that editors Kassow and Roskies call “one of the most tragic and dramatic in Jewish history.” Organized geographically and then by genre, this book details Jewish cultural and intellectual resources throughout this era, particularly in political thought, literature, the visual and performing arts, and religion. This volume explores worldwide Jewish perceptions of momentous events that transpired in the mid‑twentieth century and how Jews redefined themselves across regions throughout an era rife with tragedy, displacement, and dispersion. The breadth and depth of this work goes beyond any comparable collection, with detailed insights and sharp focus to accompany its breathtaking scope. A major, ten‑volume anthology project more than a decade in the making, the Posen Library is an ideal reference tool for scholars, teachers, and students at all levels.