A graduate level text based partly on lectures in geometry, mechanics, and symmetry given at Imperial College London, this book links traditional classical mechanics texts and advanced modern mathematical treatments of the subject.

Advanced undergraduate and graduate students in mathematics, physics and engineering.

Based on the 1991 LMS Invited Lectures given by Professor Marsden, this book discusses and applies symmetry methods to such areas as bifurcations and chaos in mechanical systems.

The lectures in this 2005 book are intended to bring young researchers to the current frontier of knowledge in geometrical mechanics and dynamical systems.

A development of the basic theory and applications of mechanics with an emphasis on the role of symmetry. The book includes numerous specific applications, making it beneficial to physicists and engineers. Specific examples and applications show how the theory works, backed by up-to-date techniques, all of which make the text accessible to a wide variety of readers, especially senior undergraduates and graduates in mathematics, physics and engineering. This second edition has been rewritten and updated for clarity throughout, with a major revamping and expansion of the exercises. Internet supplements containing additional material are also available.

Whenever systems are governed by continuous chains of causes and effects, their behavior exhibits the consequences of dynamical symmetries, many of them far from obvious. Dynamical Symmetry introduces the reader to Sophus Lie's discoveries of the connections between differential equations and continuous groups that underlie this observation. It develops and applies the mathematical relations between dynamics and geometry that result. Systematic methods for uncovering dynamical symmetries are described, and put to use. Much material in the book is new and some has only recently appeared in research journals. Though Lie groups play a key role in elementary particle physics, their connection with differential equations is more often exploited in applied mathematics and engineering. Dynamical Symmetry bridges this gap in a novel manner designed to help readers establish new connections in their own areas of interest. Emphasis is placed on applications to physics and chemistry. Applications to many of the other sciences illustrate both general principles and the ubiquitousness of dynamical symmetries.

Symplectic geometry has its origins as a geometric language for classical mechanics. But it has recently exploded into an independent field interconnected with many other areas of mathematics and physics. The goal of the IAS/Park City Mathematics Institute Graduate Summer School on Symplectic Geometry and Topology was to give an intensive introduction to these exciting areas of current research. Included in this proceedings are lecture notes from the following courses: Introductionto Symplectic Topology by D. McDuff; Holomorphic Curves and Dynamics in Dimension Three by H. Hofer; An Introduction to the Seiberg-Witten Equations on Symplectic Manifolds by C. Taubes; Lectures on Floer Homology by D. Salamon; A Tutorial on Quantum Cohomology by A. Givental; Euler Characteristicsand Lagrangian Intersections by R. MacPherson; Hamiltonian Group Actions and Symplectic Reduction by L. Jeffrey; and Mechanics: Symmetry and Dynamics by J. Marsden. Information for our distributors: Titles in this series are copublished with the Institute for Advanced Study/Park City Mathematics Institute. Members of the Mathematical Association of America (MAA) and the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM) receive a 20% discount from list price.

Several well-established geometric and topological methods are used in this work in an application to a beautiful physical phenomenon known as the geometric phase. This book examines the geometric phase, bringing together different physical phenomena under a unified mathematical scheme. The material is presented so that graduate students and researchers in applied mathematics and physics with an understanding of classical and quantum mechanics can handle the text.

Geometric Mechanics here means mechanics on a pseudo-riemannian manifold and the main goal is the study of some mechanical models and concepts, with emphasis on the intrinsic and geometric aspects arising in classical problems. The first seven chapters are written in the spirit of Newtonian Mechanics while the last two ones as well as two of the four appendices describe the foundations and some aspects of Special and General Relativity. All the material has a coordinate free presentation but, for the sake of motivation, many examples and exercises are included in order to exhibit the desirable flavor of physical applications.

The principles of gauge symmetry and quantization are fundamental to modern understanding of the laws of electromagnetism, weak and strong subatomic forces and the theory of general relativity. Ideal for graduate students and researchers in theoretical and mathematical physics, this unique book provides a systematic introduction to Hamiltonian mechanics of systems with gauge symmetry. The book reveals how gauge symmetry may lead to a non-trivial geometry of the physical phase space and studies its effect on quantum dynamics by path integral methods. It also covers aspects of Hamiltonian path integral formalism in detail, along with a number of related topics such as the theory of canonical transformations on phase space supermanifolds, non-commutativity of canonical quantization and elimination of non-physical variables. The discussion is accompanied by numerous detailed examples of dynamical models with gauge symmetries, clearly illustrating the key concepts.