Methods Mathematical Physics Courant

In the present edition I have included "Supplements and Problems" located at the end of each chapter. This was done with the aim of illustrating the possibilities of the methods contained in the book, as well as with the desire to make good on what I have attempted to do over the course of many years for my students-to awaken their creativity, providing topics for independent work. The source of my own initial research was the famous two-volume book Methods of Mathematical Physics by D. Hilbert and R. Courant, and a series of original articles and surveys on partial differential equations and their applications to problems in theoretical mechanics and physics.

In the present edition I have included "Supplements and Problems" located at the end of each chapter. This was done with the aim of illustrating the possibilities of the methods contained in the book, as well as with the desire to make good on what I have attempted to do over the course of many years for my students-to awaken their creativity, providing topics for independent work. The source of my own initial research was the famous two-volume book Methods of Mathematical Physics by D. Hilbert and R. Courant, and a series of original articles and surveys on partial differential equations and their applications to problems in theoretical mechanics and physics.

In the present edition I have included "Supplements and Problems" located at the end of each chapter. This was done with the aim of illustrating the possibilities of the methods contained in the book, as well as with the desire to make good on what I have attempted to do over the course of many years for my students-to awaken their creativity, providing topics for independent work. The source of my own initial research was the famous two-volume book Methods of Mathematical Physics by D. Hilbert and R. Courant, and a series of original articles and surveys on partial differential equations and their applications to problems in theoretical mechanics and physics.

In 1924 the firm of Julius Springer published the first volume of Methods of Mathematical Physics by Richard Courant and David Hilbert. In the preface, Courant says this: Since the seventeenth century, physical intuition has served as a vital source for mathematical problems and methods. Recent trends and fashions have, however, weakened the connection between mathematics and physics; mathematicians, turning away from the roots of mathematics in intuition, have concentrated on refinement and emphasized the postulational side of mathematics, and at times have overlooked the unity of their science with physics and other fields.

This book provides a rapid overview of the basic methods and concepts in mechanics for beginning Ph.D. students and advanced undergraduates in applied mathematics or related fields. It is based on a graduate course given in 2006-07 at the Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences. Among other topics, the book introduces Newton's law, action principles, Hamilton-Jacobi theory, geometric wave theory, analytical and numerical statistical mechanics, discrete and continuous quantum mechanics, and quantum path-integral methods.