Lectures On Lie Groups Second Edition

An excellent introduction to the theory of Lie groups and Lie algebras.

This volume consists of nine lectures on selected topics of Lie group theory. We provide the readers a concise introduction as well as a comprehensive 'tour of revisiting' the remarkable achievements of S Lie, W Killing, É Cartan and H Weyl on structural and classification theory of semi-simple Lie groups, Lie algebras and their representations; and also the wonderful duet of Cartan's theory on Lie groups and symmetric spaces.With the benefit of retrospective hindsight, mainly inspired by the outstanding contribution of H Weyl in the special case of compact connected Lie groups, we develop the above theory via a route quite different from the original methods engaged by most other books.We begin our revisiting with the compact theory which is much simpler than that of the general semi-simple Lie theory; mainly due to the well fittings between the Frobenius-Schur character theory and the maximal tori theorem of É Cartan together with Weyl's reduction (cf. Lectures 1-4). It is a wonderful reality of the Lie theory that the clear-cut orbital geometry of the adjoint action of compact Lie groups on themselves (i.e. the geometry of conjugacy classes) is not only the key to understand the compact theory, but it actually already constitutes the central core of the entire semi-simple theory, as well as that of the symmetric spaces (cf. Lectures 5-9). This is the main reason that makes the succeeding generalizations to the semi-simple Lie theory, and then further to the Cartan theory on Lie groups and symmetric spaces, conceptually quite natural, and technically rather straightforward.

"This volume consists of nine lectures on selected topics of Lie group theory. We provide the readers a concise introduction as well as a comprehensive "tour of revisiting" the remarkable achievements of S Lie, W Killing, É Cartan and H Weyl on structural and classification theory of semi-simple Lie groups, Lie algebras and their representations; and also the wonderful duet of Cartan's theory on Lie groups and symmetric spaces. With the benefit of retrospective hindsight, mainly inspired by the outstanding contribution of H Weyl in the special case of compact connected Lie groups, we develop the above theory via a route quite different from the original methods engaged by most other books. We begin our revisiting with the compact theory which is much simpler than that of the general semi-simple Lie theory; mainly due to the well fittings between the Frobenius–Schur character theory and the maximal tori theorem of É Cartan together with Weyl's reduction (cf. Lectures 1–4). It is a wonderful reality of the Lie theory that the clear-cut orbital geometry of the adjoint action of compact Lie groups on themselves (i.e. the geometry of conjugacy classes) is not only the key to understand the compact theory, but it actually already constitutes the central core of the entire semi-simple theory, as well as that of the symmetric spaces (cf. Lectures 5–9). This is the main reason that makes the succeeding generalizations to the semi-simple Lie theory, and then further to the Cartan theory on Lie groups and symmetric spaces, conceptually quite natural, and technically rather straightforward."--Publisher's website.

This book is intended for a one-year graduate course on Lie groups and Lie algebras. The book goes beyond the representation theory of compact Lie groups, which is the basis of many texts, and provides a carefully chosen range of material to give the student the bigger picture. The book is organized to allow different paths through the material depending on one's interests. This second edition has substantial new material, including improved discussions of underlying principles, streamlining of some proofs, and many results and topics that were not in the first edition. For compact Lie groups, the book covers the Peter–Weyl theorem, Lie algebra, conjugacy of maximal tori, the Weyl group, roots and weights, Weyl character formula, the fundamental group and more. The book continues with the study of complex analytic groups and general noncompact Lie groups, covering the Bruhat decomposition, Coxeter groups, flag varieties, symmetric spaces, Satake diagrams, embeddings of Lie groups and spin. Other topics that are treated are symmetric function theory, the representation theory of the symmetric group, Frobenius–Schur duality and GL(n) × GL(m) duality with many applications including some in random matrix theory, branching rules, Toeplitz determinants, combinatorics of tableaux, Gelfand pairs, Hecke algebras, the "philosophy of cusp forms" and the cohomology of Grassmannians. An appendix introduces the reader to the use of Sage mathematical software for Lie group computations.

This book is an introduction to semisimple Lie algebras. It is concise and informal, with numerous exercises and examples.

DIVDefinitive treatment of important subject in modern mathematics. Covers split semi-simple Lie algebras, universal enveloping algebras, classification of irreducible modules, automorphisms, simple Lie algebras over an arbitrary field, etc. Index. /div

"[Lectures in Lie Groups] fulfills its aim admirably and should be a useful reference for any mathematician who would like to learn the basic results for compact Lie groups. . . . The book is a well written basic text [and Adams] has done a service to the mathematical community."—Irving Kaplansky

Three of the leading figures in the field have composed this excellent introduction to the theory of Lie groups and Lie algebras. Together these lectures provide an elementary account of the theory that is unsurpassed. In the first part, Roger Carter concentrates on Lie algebras and root systems. In the second Graeme Segal discusses Lie groups. And in the final part, Ian Macdonald gives an introduction to special linear groups. Graduate students requiring an introduction to the theory of Lie groups and their applications should look no further than this book.

This book has grown out of a set of lecture notes I had prepared for a course on Lie groups in 1966. When I lectured again on the subject in 1972, I revised the notes substantially. It is the revised version that is now appearing in book form. The theory of Lie groups plays a fundamental role in many areas of mathematics. There are a number of books on the subject currently available -most notably those of Chevalley, Jacobson, and Bourbaki-which present various aspects of the theory in great depth. However, 1 feei there is a need for a single book in English which develops both the algebraic and analytic aspects of the theory and which goes into the representation theory of semi simple Lie groups and Lie algebras in detail. This book is an attempt to fiii this need. It is my hope that this book will introduce the aspiring graduate student as well as the nonspecialist mathematician to the fundamental themes of the subject. I have made no attempt to discuss infinite-dimensional representations. This is a very active field, and a proper treatment of it would require another volume (if not more) of this size. However, the reader who wants to take up this theory will find that this book prepares him reasonably well for that task.