This book discusses topics ranging from traditional areas of topology, such as knot theory and the topology of manifolds, to areas such as differential and algebraic geometry. It also discusses other topics such as three-manifolds, group actions, and algebraic varieties.

Interest in the study of geometry is currently enjoying a resurgence-understandably so, as the study of curves was once the playground of some very great mathematicians. However, many of the subject's more exciting aspects require a somewhat advanced mathematics background. For the "fun stuff" to be accessible, we need to offer students an introduction with modest prerequisites, one that stimulates their interest and focuses on problem solving. Integrating parametric, algebraic, and projective curves into a single text, Geometry of Curves offers students a unique approach that provides a mathematical structure for solving problems, not just a catalog of theorems. The author begins with the basics, then takes students on a fascinating journey from conics, higher algebraic and transcendental curves, through the properties of parametric curves, the classification of lima's, envelopes, and finally to projective curves, their relationship to algebraic curves, and their application to asymptotes and boundedness. The uniqueness of this treatment lies in its integration of the different types of curves, its use of analytic methods, and its generous number of examples, exercises, and illustrations. The result is a practical text, almost entirely self-contained, that not only imparts a deeper understanding of the theory, but inspires a heightened appreciation of geometry and interest in more advanced studies.

This volume contains the proceedings of the special session on Modern Methods in Continuum Theory presented at the 100th Annual Joint Mathematics Meetings held in Cincinnati, Ohio. It also features the Houston Problem Book which includes a recently updated set of 200 problems accumulated over several years at the University of Houston.;These proceedings and problems are aimed at pure and applied mathematicians, topologists, geometers, physicists and graduate-level students in these disciplines.

"Based on the proceedings of the Special Session on Geometry and Physics held over a six month period at the University of Aarhus, Denmark and on articles from the Summer school held at Odense University, Denmark. Offers new contributions on a host of topics that involve physics, geometry, and topology. Written by more than 50 leading international experts."

This important reference - based on the proceedings of the Special Session on Geometry and Physics held over a six-month period at the University of Aarhus, Denmark, and on articles from the summer school held at Odense University, Denmark - offers new contributions on a host of topics that involve physics, geometry, and topology. Written by more than 50 leading international experts, Geometry and Physics presents the Seiberg-Witten invariants that facilitate the solution of open problems in Donaldson's theory...describes applications of the Seiberg-Witten invariants...analyzes moduli spaces of semi-stable bundles over Riemann surfaces...addresses operator algebras and topology...demonstrates the planar topological aspects of subfactors...examines symplectic geometry and Einstein metrics...discusses novel ways of computing curvature and holonomy for the determinant line bundle...elucidates the new topic of finite type invariants of three-manifolds and relations with nonperturbative quantum invariants...delineates recent work on a purely topological approach to physics-inspired invariants...and much more. Generously illustrated and containing over 800 key bibliographic citations, Geometry and Physics is an indispensable resource for geometers, topologists, mathematical and theoretical physicists, and graduate-level students in these disciplines.

For the past forty years, Robert Bartnik has been one of the leading mathematicians working on mathematical general relativity and geometric analysis. Since his early dissertation work on the existence of maximal hypersurfaces in general asymptotically flat spacetimes, done under the guidance of S.T. Yau at the Institute for Advanced Study at Princeton, Bartnik's work has had a major impact on a number of different areas in mathematical relativity. His careful definition of the ADM mass on asymptotically Euclidean geometries, together with his analysis of the Laplace operator on such geometries, has been highly influential in geometric analysis. This work led in turn to his insightful definition of ""quasi-local mass,"" a topic of intense interest to this day. Bartnik's collaboration with his student John McKinnon resulted in their iconic discovery of a globally regular static solution of the Einstein-Yang-Mills equations. His proof that there exist globally hyperbolic spacetime solutions of Einstein's equations, which contain no constant mean curvature Cauchy surfaces, was very surprising, and has led to a variety of further results of this nature. The procedure he developed for generating solutions of the Einstein constraint equations using a parabolic PDE system, has already led to important applications and is likely to be very useful in the future. With the publication of this volume, the editors wish to honor Robert Bartnik's great contributions to their field. Included in this collection are most of his published papers, together with short essays by friends and colleagues who have been strongly influenced by him. The editors dedicate this collection to Robert, and to all those who will greatly benefit from being introduced to his work.

This book collects and organizes work in quasi-uniformities and quasi-proximities in order to encourage the use of the structures in general topology. It discusses a radically different viewpoint of topology, leading to new insights into purely topological problems.

The original edition of The Geometry of Musical Rhythm was the first book to provide a systematic and accessible computational geometric analysis of the musical rhythms of the world. It explained how the study of the mathematical properties of musical rhythm generates common mathematical problems that arise in a variety of seemingly disparate fields. The book also introduced the distance approach to phylogenetic analysis and illustrated its application to the study of musical rhythm. The new edition retains all of this, while also adding 100 pages, 93 figures, 225 new references, and six new chapters covering topics such as meter and metric complexity, rhythmic grouping, expressive timbre and timing in rhythmic performance, and evolution phylogenetic analysis of ancient Greek paeonic rhythms. In addition, further context is provided to give the reader a fuller and richer insight into the historical connections between music and mathematics.

This book is a collection of exercises for courses in higher algebra, linear algebra and geometry. It is helpful for postgraduate students in checking the solutions and answers to the exercises.

Based on a conference held in honor of Professor Tarow Indow, this volume is organized into three major topics concerning the use of geometry in perception:
* space -- referring to attempts to represent the subjective space within which we locate ourselves and perceive objects to reside;
* color -- dealing with attempts to represent the structure of color percepts as revealed by various experimental procedures; and
* scaling -- focusing on the organization of various bodies of data -- in this case perceptual -- through scaling techniques, primarily multidimensional ones.
These topics provide a natural organization of the work in the field, as well as one that corresponds to the major aspects of Indow's contributions. This book's goal is to provide the reader with an overview of the issues in each of the areas, and to present current results from the laboratories of leading researchers in these areas.

This book presents an innovative synthesis of methods used to study the problems of equivalence and symmetry that arise in a variety of mathematical fields and physical applications. It draws on a wide range of disciplines, including geometry, analysis, applied mathematics, and algebra. Dr. Olver develops systematic and constructive methods for solving equivalence problems and calculating symmetries, and applies them to a variety of mathematical systems, including differential equations, variational problems, manifolds, Riemannian metrics, polynomials, and differential operators. He emphasizes the construction and classification of invariants and reductions of complicated objects to simple canonical forms. This book will be a valuable resource for students and researchers in geometry, analysis, algebra, mathematical physics and related fields.

Fractals and surfaces are two of the most widely-studied areas of modern physics. In fact, most surfaces in nature are fractals. In this book, Drs. Barabási and Stanley explain how fractals can be successfully used to describe and predict the morphology of surface growth. The authors begin by presenting basic growth models and the principles used to develop them. They next demonstrate how models can be used to answer specific questions about surface roughness. In the second half of the book, they discuss in detail two classes of phenomena: fluid flow in porous media and molecular beam epitaxy (MBE). In each case, the authors review the model and analytical approach, and present experimental results. This book is the first attempt to unite the subjects of fractals and surfaces, and it will appeal to advanced undergraduate and graduate students in condensed matter physics and statistical mechanics. Because of the technological importance of MBE, it will also be of interest to scientists, particularly materials scientists, working in industry and research. Interested readers may view a sample chapter by contacting our web site at http://www.cup.org/onlinepubs/Fractals/fracts1.html.

This volume contains the proceedings of the special session on Modern Methods in Continuum Theory presented at the 100th Annual Joint Mathematics Meetings held in Cincinnati, Ohio. It also features the Houston Problem Book which includes a recently updated set of 200 problems accumulated over several years at the University of Houston.;These proceedings and problems are aimed at pure and applied mathematicians, topologists, geometers, physicists and graduate-level students in these disciplines.

The aim of this work is to apply variational methods and critical point theory on infinite dimensional manifolds, to some problems in Lorentzian Geometry which have a variational nature, such as existence and multiplicity results on geodesics and Relations between such geodesics and the topology of the manifold (in the spirit of Morse Theory). In particular Ljusternik-Schnirelmann critical point theory and Morse theory are exploited. Moreover, the results for general Lorentzian manifolds should be applied to physically relevant space-times of General Relativity, like Schwarzschild and Kerr space-times.

Based on the Working Conference on Boundary Control and Boundary Variation held in Sophia-Antipolis, France, this work provides important examinations of shape optimization and boundary control of hyperbolic systems, including free boundary problems and stabilization. It offers a new approach to large and nonlinear variation of the boundary using global Eulerian co-ordinates and intrinsic geometry.

Multifractal theory was introduced by theoretical physicists in 1986. Since then, multifractals have increasingly been studied by mathematicians. This new work presents the latest research on random results on random multifractals and the physical thermodynamical interpretation of these results. As the amount of work in this area increases, Lars Olsen presents a unifying approach to current multifractal theory. Featuring high quality, original research material, this important new book fills a gap in the current literature available, providing a rigorous mathematical treatment of multifractal measures.

Within the subject of topological dynamics, there has been considerable recent interest in systems where the underlying topological space is a Cantor set. Such systems have an inherently combinatorial nature, and seminal ideas of Anatoly Vershik allowed for a combinatorial model, called the Bratteli-Vershik model, for such systems with no non-trivial closed invariant subsets. This model led to a construction of an ordered abelian group which is an algebraic invariant of the system providing a complete classification of such systems up to orbit equivalence. The goal of this book is to give a statement of this classification result and to develop ideas and techniques leading to it. Rather than being a comprehensive treatment of the area, this book is aimed at students and researchers trying to learn about some surprising connections between dynamics and algebra. The only background material needed is a basic course in group theory and a basic course in general topology.

This 1994 text covers finite linear spaces. It contains all the important results that had been published up to the time of publication, and is designed to be used not only as a resource for researchers in this and related areas, but also as a graduate-level text. In eight chapters the authors introduce and review fundamental results, and go on to cover the major areas of interest in linear spaces. A combinatorial approach is used for the greater part of the book, but in the final chapter recent advances in group theory relating to finite linear spaces are presented. At the end of each chapter there is a set of exercises which are designed to test comprehension of the material, and there is also a section of problems for researchers. It will be an invaluable book for researchers in geometry and combinatorics as well as forming an excellent text for graduate students.

This volume contains papers presented at the 27th Taniguchi International Symposium, held in Sanda, Japan - focusing on the study of moduli spaces of various geometric objects such as Einstein metrics, conformal structures, and Yang-Mills connections from algebraic and analytic points of view.;Written by over 15 authorities from around the world, Einstein Metrics and Yang-Mills Connections...: discusses current topics in Kaehler geometry, including Kaehler-Einstein metrics, Hermitian-Einstein connections and a new Kaehler version of Kawamata-Viehweg's vanishing theorem; explores algebraic geometric treatments of holomorphic vector bundles on curves and surfaces; addresses nonlinear problems related to Mong-Ampere and Yamabe-type equations as well as nonlinear equations in mathematical physics; and covers interdisciplinary topics such as twistor theory, magnetic monopoles, KP-equations, Einstein and Gibbons-Hawking metrics, and supercommutative algebras of superdifferential operators.;Providing a wide array of original research articles not published elsewhere Einstein Metrics and Yang-Mills Connections is for research mathematicians, including topologists and differential and algebraic geometers, theoretical physicists, and graudate-level students in these disciplines.

Pesin theory consists of the study of the theory of non-uniformly hyperbolic diffeomorphisms. The aim of this book is to provide the reader with a straightforward account of this theory, following the approaches of Katok and Newhouse. The notes are divided into two parts. The first develops the basic theory, starting with general ergodic theory and introducing Liapunov exponents. Part Two deals with the applications of Pesin theory and contains an account of the existence (and distribution) of periodic points. It closes with a look at stable manifolds, and gives some results on absolute continuity. These lecture notes provide a unique introduction to Pesin theory and its applications. The author assumes that the reader has only a good background of undergraduate analysis and nothing further, so making the book accessible to complete newcomers to the field.

Although it arose from purely theoretical considerations of the underlying axioms of geometry, the work of Einstein and Dirac has demonstrated that hyperbolic geometry is a fundamental aspect of modern physics. In this book, the rich geometry of the hyperbolic plane is studied in detail, leading to the focal point of the book, Poincare"s polygon theorem and the relationship between hyperbolic geometries and discrete groups of isometries. Hyperbolic 3-space is also discussed, and the directions that current research in this field is taking are sketched. This will be an excellent introduction to hyperbolic geometry for students new to the subject, and for experts in other fields.

This book presents a definitive account of the applications of the algebraic L-theory to the surgery classification of topological manifolds. The central result is the identification of a manifold structure in the homotopy type of a Poincare duality space with a local quadratic structure in the chain homotopy type of the universal cover. The difference between the homotopy types of manifolds and Poincare duality spaces is identified with the fibre of the algebraic L-theory assembly map, which passes from local to global quadratic duality structures on chain complexes. The algebraic L-theory assembly map is used to give a purely algebraic formulation of the Novikov conjectures on the homotopy invariance of the higher signatures; any other formulation necessarily factors through this one. The book is designed as an introduction to the subject, accessible to graduate students in topology; no previous acquaintance with surgery theory is assumed, and every algebraic concept is justified by its occurrence in topology.

This book presents original problems from graduate courses in pure and applied mathematics and even small research topics, significant theorems and information on recent results. It is helpful for specialists working in differential equations.

Traditionally the Adams-Novikov spectral sequence has been a tool which has enabled the computation of generators and relations to describe homotopy groups. Here a natural geometric description of the sequence is given in terms of cobordism theory and manifolds with singularities. The author brings together many interesting results not widely known outside the USSR, including some recent work by Vershinin. This book will be of great interest to researchers into algebraic topology.

This is the first exposition of the theory of quasi-symmetric designs, that is, combinatorial designs with at most two block intersection numbers. The authors aim to bring out the interaction among designs, finite geometries, and strongly regular graphs. The book starts with basic, classical material on designs and strongly regular graphs and continues with a discussion of some important results on quasi-symmetric designs. The later chapters include a combinatorial construction of the Witt designs from the projective plane of order four, recent results dealing with a structural study of designs resulting from Cameron's classification theory on extensions of symmetric designs, and results on the classification problem of quasi-symmetric designs. The final chapter presents connections to coding theory.