Quantum Field Theory for the Gifted Amateur
Tom Lancaster and Stephen J. Blundell
Abstract
Quantum field theory is arguably the most far-reaching and beautiful physical theory ever constructed, with aspects more stringently tested and verified to greater precision than any other theory in physics. Unfortunately, the subject has gained a notorious reputation for difficulty with forbidding looking mathematics and a peculiar diagrammatic language described in an array of unforgiving, weighty textbooks aimed firmly at aspiring professionals. However, quantum field theory is too important, too beautiful and too engaging to be restricted to the professionals. This book on quantum field th ... More
Quantum field theory is arguably the most far-reaching and beautiful physical theory ever constructed, with aspects more stringently tested and verified to greater precision than any other theory in physics. Unfortunately, the subject has gained a notorious reputation for difficulty with forbidding looking mathematics and a peculiar diagrammatic language described in an array of unforgiving, weighty textbooks aimed firmly at aspiring professionals. However, quantum field theory is too important, too beautiful and too engaging to be restricted to the professionals. This book on quantum field theory is designed to be different. It is written by experimental physicists and aimed to provide the interested amateur with a bridge from undergraduate physics to quantum field theory. The imagined reader is a gifted amateur possessing a curious and adaptable mind looking to be told an entertaining and intellectually stimulating story, but who will not feel patronized if a few mathematical niceties are spelled out in detail.
Keywords:
quantum field theory,
second quantization,
Feynman diagrams,
functional integrals,
renormalization,
quantum electrodynamics,
condensed matter theory,
particle theory
Bibliographic Information
| Print publication date: 2014 |
Print ISBN-13: 9780199699322 |
| Published to Oxford Scholarship Online: June 2014 |
DOI:10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199699322.001.0001 |
Authors
Affiliations are at time of print publication.
Tom Lancaster, author
Lecturer in Physics, Department of Physics, University of Durham
Stephen J. Blundell, author
Professor of Physics, Department of Physics, University of Oxford
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