Book Description

This book is a tribute to the life and work of J Q Chen. The contributions of Chen to nuclear and molecular physics are discussed vis-a-vis present developments in these fields. Among other subjects, the present status of microscopic theories of the interacting boson model in nuclear physics and the theory of symmetry adaptation of molecular vibrations in molecular physics are reviewed. The latter theory is particularly useful for large molecular species such as fullerenes, where icosahedral symmetry plays a fundamental role. Contents: A Conceptual Review of the New Approach to Group Representation Theory (F Wang, Nanjing University, China); The Interacting Boson Model (P Van Isacker, GANIL, France); Structure of Nuclei Near the First Order Spherical-Deformed Phase Transition in the Interacting Boson Model (N V Zamfir, G E, Fernandes & R F Casten, Yale University, USA); Dynamical Symmetry Approach to Collective Motions in Many-Body Systems (C-L Wu, National Center for Theoretical Sciences, Taiwan); Fermion Dynamical Symmetries and High Temperature Superconductors (M Guidry, University of Tennessee, USA); Quantum Mechanics on a Sphere (J N Ginocchio, Los Alamos National Laboratory, USA); The Method of Symmetrized Bosons (F Iachello, Yale University, Connecticut); The Perturbed Dirac-Coulomb Problem via SO(2,1) Algebra. A Dilemma! (K T Hecht, University of Michigan, USA); Continuous Groups and Molecular Electronic Structure (J Paldus & X-Z Li); and other papers. Readership: Researchers in nuclear, molecular and mathematical physics."