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Quantum field theory provides the theoretical backbone to most modern physics. This book is designed to bring quantum field theory to a wider audience of physicists. It is packed with worked examples, witty diagrams, and applications intended to introduce a new audience to this revolutionary theory.
List of contents
- Overture
- I: The Universe as a set of harmonic oscillators
- 1: Lagrangians
- 2: Simple harmonic oscillators
- 3: Occupation number representation
- 4: Making second quantization work
- II: Writing down Lagrangians
- 5: Continuous systems
- 6: A first stab at relativistic quantum mechanics
- 7: Examples of Lagrangians, or how to write down a theory
- III: The need for quantum fields
- 8: The passage of time
- 9: Quantum mechanical transformations
- 10: Symmetry
- 11: Canonical quantization of fields
- 12: Examples of canonical quantization
- 13: Fields with many components and massive electromagnetism
- 14: Gauge fields and gauge theory
- 15: Discrete transformations
- IV: Propagators and perturbations
- 16: Ways of doing quantum mechanics: propagators and Green's functions
- 17: Propagators and Fields
- 18: The S-matrix
- 19: Expanding the S-matrix: Feynman diagrams
- 20: Scattering theory
- V: Interlude: wisdom from statistical physics
- 21: Statistical physics: a crash course
- 22: The generating functional for fields
- VI: Path Integrals
- 23: Path Integrals: I said to him, "You're crazy"
- 24: Field Integrals
- 25: Statistical field theory
- 26: Broken symmetry
- 27: Coherent states
- 28: Grassmann numbers: coherent states and the path integral for fermions
- VII: Topological ideas
- 29: Topological objects
- 30: Topological field theory
- VIII: Renormalization: taming the infinite
- 31: Renormalization, quasiparticles and the Fermi surface
- 32: Renormalization: the problem and its solution
- 33: Renormalization in action: propagators and Feynman diagrams
- 34: The renormalization group
- 35: Ferromagnetism: a renormalization group tutorial
- IX: Putting a spin on QFT
- 36: The Dirac equation
- 37: How to transform a spinor
- 38: The quantum Dirac field
- 39: A rough guide to quantum electrodynamics
- 40: QED scattering: three famous cross sections
- 41: The renormalization of QED and two great results
- X: Some applications from the world of condensed matter
- 42: Superfluids
- 43: The many-body problem and the metal
- 44: Superconductors
- 45: The fractional quantum Hall fluid
- XI: Some applications from the world of particle physics
- 46: Non-abelian gauge theory
- 47: The Weinberg-Salam model
- 48: Majorana fermions
- 49: Magnetic monopoles
- 50: Instantons, tunnelling and the end of the world
- Appendix A: Further reading
- Appendix B: Useful complex analysis
About the author
Tom Lancaster was a Research Fellow in Physics at the University of Oxford, before becoming a Lecturer at the University of Durham in 2012.
Stephen J. Blundell is a Professor of Physics at the University of Oxford and a Fellow of Mansfield College, Oxford.
Summary
Quantum field theory provides the theoretical backbone to most modern physics. This book is designed to bring quantum field theory to a wider audience of physicists. It is packed with worked examples, witty diagrams, and applications intended to introduce a new audience to this revolutionary theory.
