Progress in low-dimensional topology has been very quick in the last three decades, leading to the solutions of many difficult problems. Among the earlier highlights of this period was Casson's -invariant that was instrumental in proving the vanishing of the Rohlin invariant of homotopy 3-spheres. The proof of the three-dimensional Poincare conjecture has rendered this application moot but hardly made Casson's contribution less relevant: in fact, a lot of modern day topology, including a multitude of Floer homology theories, can be traced back to his -invariant. The principal goal of this book, now in its second revised edition, remains providing an introduction to the low-dimensional topology and Casson's theory; it also reaches out, when appropriate, to more recent research topics. The book covers some classical material, such as Heegaard splittings, Dehn surgery, and invariants of knots and links. It then proceeds through the Kirby calculus and Rohlin's theorem to Casson's invariant and its applications, and concludes with a brief overview of recent developments. The book will be accessible to graduate students in mathematics and theoretical physics familiar with some elementary algebraic and differential topology, including the fundamental group, basic homology theory, transversality, and Poincare duality on manifolds.

Formes sesquilineaires et formes quadratiques

Les Elements de mathematique de Nicolas BOURBAKI ont pour objet une presentation rigoureuse, systematique et sans prerequis des mathematiques depuis leurs fondements.

Ce neuvieme chapitre du Livre d Algebre, deuxieme Livre du traite, est consacre aux formes quadratiques, symplectiques ou hermitiennes et aux groupes associes.

Il contient egalement une note historique.

Ce volume est une reimpression de l edition de 1959."

This is a two-volume collection presenting the selected works of Herbert Busemann, one of the leading geometers of the twentieth century and one of the main founders of metric geometry, convexity theory and convexity in metric spaces. Busemann also did substantial work (probably the most important) on Hilbert's Problem IV. These collected works include Busemann's most important published articles on these topics. Volume I of the collection features Busemann's papers on the foundations of geodesic spaces and on the metric geometry of Finsler spaces. Volume II includes Busemann's papers on convexity and integral geometry, on Hilbert's Problem IV, and other papers on miscellaneous subjects. Each volume offers biographical documents and introductory essays on Busemann's work, documents from his correspondence and introductory essays written by leading specialists on Busemann's work. They are a valuable resource for researchers in synthetic and metric geometry, convexity theory and the foundations of geometry.