The representation theory of affine Lie algebras has been developed in close connection with various areas of mathematics and mathematical physics in the last two decades. There are three excellent books on it, written by Victor G Kac. This book begins with a survey and review of the material treated in Kac's books. In particular, modular invariance and conformal invariance are explained in more detail. The book then goes further, dealing with some of the recent topics involving the representation theory of affine Lie algebras. Since these topics are important not only in themselves but also in their application to some areas of mathematics and mathematical physics, the book expounds them with examples and detailed calculations.

This volume records most of the talks given at the Conference on Infinite-dimensional Groups held at the Mathematical Sciences Research Institute at Berkeley, California, May 10-May 15, 1984, as a part of the special program on Kac-Moody Lie algebras. The purpose of the conference was to review recent developments of the theory of infinite-dimensional groups and its applications. The present collection concentrates on three very active, interrelated directions of the field: general Kac-Moody groups, gauge groups (especially loop groups) and diffeomorphism groups. I would like to express my thanks to the MSRI for sponsoring the meeting, to Ms. Faye Yeager for excellent typing, to the authors for their manuscripts, and to Springer-Verlag for publishing this volume. V. Kac INFINITE DIMENSIONAL GROUPS WITH APPLICATIONS CONTENTS The Lie Group Structure of M. Adams. T. Ratiu 1 Diffeomorphism Groups and & R. Schmid Invertible Fourier Integral Operators with Applications On Landau-Lifshitz Equation and E. Date 71 Infinite Dimensional Groups Flat Manifolds and Infinite D. S. Freed 83 Dimensional Kahler Geometry Positive-Energy Representations R. Goodman 125 of the Group of Diffeomorphisms of the Circle Instantons and Harmonic Maps M. A. Guest 137 A Coxeter Group Approach to Z. Haddad 157 Schubert Varieties Constructing Groups Associated to V. G. Kac 167 Infinite-Dimensional Lie Algebras I. Kaplansky 217 Harish-Chandra Modules Over the Virasoro Algebra & L. J. Santharoubane 233 Rational Homotopy Theory of Flag S.

Lie superalgebras are a natural generalization of Lie algebras, having applications in geometry, number theory, gauge field theory, and string theory. Introduction to Finite and Infinite Dimensional Lie Algebras and Superalgebras introduces the theory of Lie superalgebras, their algebras, and their representations. The material covered ranges from basic definitions of Lie groups to the classification of finite-dimensional representations of semi-simple Lie algebras. While discussing all classes of finite and infinite dimensional Lie algebras and Lie superalgebras in terms of their different classes of root systems, the book focuses on Kac-Moody algebras. With numerous exercises and worked examples, it is ideal for graduate courses on Lie groups and Lie algebras. - Discusses the fundamental structure and all root relationships of Lie algebras and Lie superalgebras and their finite and infinite dimensional representation theory - Closely describes BKM Lie superalgebras, their different classes of imaginary root systems, their complete classifications, root-supermultiplicities, and related combinatorial identities - Includes numerous tables of the properties of individual Lie algebras and Lie superalgebras - Focuses on Kac-Moody algebras

This monograph gives an overview of various classes of infinite-dimensional Lie groups and their applications in Hamiltonian mechanics, fluid dynamics, integrable systems, gauge theory, and complex geometry. The text includes many exercises and open questions.

Lie groups and Lie algebras have become essential to many parts of mathematics and theoretical physics, with Lie algebras a central object of interest in their own right. This book provides an elementary introduction to Lie algebras based on a lecture course given to fourth-year undergraduates. The only prerequisite is some linear algebra and an appendix summarizes the main facts that are needed. The treatment is kept as simple as possible with no attempt at full generality. Numerous worked examples and exercises are provided to test understanding, along with more demanding problems, several of which have solutions. Introduction to Lie Algebras covers the core material required for almost all other work in Lie theory and provides a self-study guide suitable for undergraduate students in their final year and graduate students and researchers in mathematics and theoretical physics.

It is only in recent times that infinite-dimensional Lie algebras have been the subject of other than sporadic study, with perhaps two exceptions: Cartan's simple algebras of infinite type, and free algebras. However, the last decade has seen a considerable increase of interest in the subject, along two fronts: the topological and the algebraic. The former, which deals largely with algebras of operators on linear spaces, or on manifolds modelled on linear spaces, has been dealt with elsewhere*). The latter, which is the subject of the present volume, exploits the surprising depth of analogy which exists between infinite-dimen sional Lie algebras and infinite groups. This is not to say that the theory consists of groups dressed in Lie-algebraic clothing. One of the tantalising aspects of the analogy, and one which renders it difficult to formalise, is that it extends to theorems better than to proofs. There are several cases where a true theorem about groups translates into a true theorem about Lie algebras, but where the group-theoretic proof uses methods not available for Lie algebras and the Lie-theoretic proof uses methods not available for groups. The two theories tend to differ in fine detail, and extra variations occur in the Lie algebra case according to the underlying field. Occasionally the analogy breaks down altogether. And of course there are parts of the Lie theory with no group-theoretic counterpart.

This book lays the foundations of differential calculus in infinite dimensions and discusses those applications in infinite dimensional differential geometry and global analysis not involving Sobolev completions and fixed point theory. The approach is simple: a mapping is called smooth if it maps smooth curves to smooth curves. Up to Fr‚chet spaces, this notion of smoothness coincides with all known reasonable concepts. In the same spirit, calculus of holomorphic mappings (including Hartogs' theorem and holomorphic uniform boundedness theorems) and calculus of real analytic mappings are developed. Existence of smooth partitions of unity, the foundations of manifold theory in infinite dimensions, the relation between tangent vectors and derivations, and differential forms are discussed thoroughly. Special emphasis is given to the notion of regular infinite dimensional Lie groups. Many applications of this theory are included: manifolds of smooth mappings, groups of diffeomorphisms, geodesics on spaces of Riemannian metrics, direct limit manifolds, perturbation theory of operators, and differentiability questions of infinite dimensional representations.

This book develops, from the viewpoint of abstract group theory, a general theory of infinite-dimensional Lie groups involving the implicit function theorem and the Frobenius theorem. Omori treats as infinite-dimensional Lie groups all the real, primitive, infinite transformation groups studied by E. Cartan. The book discusses several noncommutative algebras such as Weyl algebras and algebras of quantum groups and their automorphism groups. The notion of a noncommutative manifold is described, and the deformation quantization of certain algebras is discussed from the viewpoint of Lie algebras. This edition is a revised version of the book of the same title published in Japanese in 1979.