This volume encloses the Proceedings of the Eighth Summer School on Theoretical Physics under the banner title Symmetry and Structural Properties of Condensed Matter (SSPCM 2005). The School, organised by Rzeszow University of Technology, Poland, together with Laboratory of Physical Foundation of Information Processing, Poland (LFPPI), was held between 31 August and 7 September 2005 in Myczkowce. The main goal of the whole series of biannual SSPCM schools (since 1990) is promotion of advanced mathematical methods within condensed matter physics, directed towards its symmetry and structural properties. This SSPCM 05 School focused on the following three main subjects: decoherence and quantum computers; the role of combinatorics in classification of solutions for exactly solvable models; geometric aspects in nanophysics. The Proceedings are divided into three parts accordingly, but particular topics can overlap between main subjects, and be related to problems pursued in previous SSPCM schools. In this way, the present school is concentrated on various aspects of theory and technology of quantum informatics, with the inclusion of exactly solvable models of statistical physics of condensed matter in low dimensions, as some natural theoretical prototypes of a quantum computer. The last SSPCM 05 was devoted to the memory of Professor Brian G Wybourne, a great Inspirer, inestimable Patron and Lecturer of the whole series of these schools. The School gathered together more than 50 participants, both advanced researchers in physics and mathematics, as well as their young collaborators and students, representing altogether 10 countries from all over the world. The Organising Committee would like to express their gratitude to all members of the International Advisory Committee for their opinions and support and to all invited lecturers and contributors for their talks and preparation of their manuscripts. Special thanks are addressed to all participants and everyone who attended for creating such a stimulating and friendly atmosphere during our meeting, and for several valuable discussions. We thank all chairmen for their polite but efficient leading of sessions. Many thanks are due to the referees who improved significantly the quality of papers presented in this volume. The organisers address special thanks to The Nicholas C. Metropolis Mathematics Foundation (USA) for a substantial initiating support, and to the Polish State Committee for Scientific Research. The hospitality of the whole team of the hotel 'Energetyk' Myczkowce is also appreciated.
This volume encloses the Proceedings of the Eighth Summer School on Theoretical Physics under the banner title Symmetry and Structural Properties of Condensed Matter (SSPCM 2005). The School, organised by Rzeszow University of Technology, Poland, together with Laboratory of Physical Foundation of Information Processing, Poland (LFPPI), was held between 31 August and 7 September 2005 in Myczkowce. The main goal of the whole series of biannual SSPCM schools (since 1990) is promotion of advanced mathematical methods within condensed matter physics, directed towards its symmetry and structural properties. This SSPCM 05 School focused on the following three main subjects: decoherence and quantum computers; the role of combinatorics in classification of solutions for exactly solvable models; geometric aspects in nanophysics. The Proceedings are divided into three parts accordingly, but particular topics can overlap between main subjects, and be related to problems pursued in previous SSPCM schools. In this way, the present school is concentrated on various aspects of theory and technology of quantum informatics, with the inclusion of exactly solvable models of statistical physics of condensed matter in low dimensions, as some natural theoretical prototypes of a quantum computer. The last SSPCM 05 was devoted to the memory of Professor Brian G Wybourne, a great Inspirer, inestimable Patron and Lecturer of the whole series of these schools. The School gathered together more than 50 participants, both advanced researchers in physics and mathematics, as well as their young collaborators and students, representing altogether 10 countries from all over the world. The Organising Committee would like to express their gratitude to all members of the International Advisory Committee for their opinions and support and to all invited lecturers and contributors for their talks and preparation of their manuscripts. Special thanks are addressed to all participants and everyone who attended for creating such a stimulating and friendly atmosphere during our meeting, and for several valuable discussions. We thank all chairmen for their polite but efficient leading of sessions. Many thanks are due to the referees who improved significantly the quality of papers presented in this volume. The organisers address special thanks to The Nicholas C. Metropolis Mathematics Foundation (USA) for a substantial initiating support, and to the Polish State Committee for Scientific Research. The hospitality of the whole team of the hotel 'Energetyk' Myczkowce is also appreciated.
This special issue of Journal of Physics A: Mathematical and Theoretical appears on the occasion of the 5th International Symposium on Quantum Theory and Symmetries (QTS5), held in Valladolid, Spain, from 22–28 July 2007. This is the fith in a series of conferences previously held in Goslar (Germany) 1999, QTS1; Cracow (Poland) 2001, QTS2; Cincinnati (USA) 2003, QTS3; and Varna (Bulgaria) 2005, QTS4. The QTS5 symposium gathered 181 participants from 39 countries working in different fields of theoretical physics. The spirit of the QTS conference series is to join researchers in a wide variety of topics in theoretical physics, as a way of making accessible recent results and the new lines of different fields. This is based on the feeling that it is good for a physicist to have a general overview as well as expertise in his/her own field. There are many other conferences devoted to specific topics, which are of interest to gain deeper insight in many technical aspects and that are quite suitable for discussions due to their small size. However, we believe that general conferences like this are interesting and worth keeping. We like the talks, in both plenary and parallel sessions, which are devoted to specific topics, to be prepared so as to be accessible to any researcher in any branch of theoretical physics. We think that this objective is compatible with rigour and high standards. As is well known, similar methods and techniques can be useful for many problems in different fields. We hope that this has been appreciated during the sessions of the QTS5 conference. The QTS5 conference offered the following list of topics: 1. Symmetries in string theory, quantum gravity and related topics 2. Symmetries in quantum field theories, conformal and related field theories, lattice and noncommutative theories, gauge theories 3.Quantum computing, information and control 4. Foundations of quantum theory 5. Quantum optics, coherent states, Wigner functions 6. Dynamical and integrable systems 7. Symmetries in condensed matter and statistical physics 8. Symmetries in particle physics, nuclear, atomic and molecular physics 9. Nonlinear quantum mechanics 10. Time asymmetric quantum mechanics 11. SUSY quantum mechanics, PT symmetries and pseudo-Hamiltonians 12. Mathematical methods for symmetries and quantum theories 13. Symmetries in chemistry, biology and other sciences Papers accepted for publication in this issue aim to provide a survey of the state of the art in different fields and contain contributions from plenary speakers. In addition, the issue contains contributions from other participants and it has also been open to other authors whose work fits into the topics of the conference. In any case, all the contributions have been refereed according to the high standards of Journal of Physics A: Mathematical and Theoretical . We are much indebted to several institutions; without their support the organization of the QTS5 symposium would not have been possible. In this respect we acknowledge the Ministerio de Educación of Spain and Junta de Castilla y León for general financial support; to Fundación Universidades de Castilla y León for a number of grants to young researchers who otherwise would not have attended the conference; also to the European Physical Society that provided a number of grants for eastern countries, and to the University of Valladolid where the event took place. We thank IOP Publishing and the staff of Journal of Physics A: Mathematical and Theoretical for the publication of this special issue. In addition, we want to express our gratitude to other members of the Local Organizing Committe of QTS5, who are not Editors of this special issue: Oscar Arratia, Juan A Calzada and Fernando Gómez. Finally, we would like to thank all the participants in the QTS5 conference for their presence, contributions, and for the good atmosphere achieved during their stay. We hope that the experience of spending these days in Valladolid has been most fruitful for all of them.
This volume continues the series of proceedings of summer schools on theoretical physics related to various aspects of the structure of condensed matter, and to appropriate mathematical methods for an adequate description. Three main topics are covered: (i) symmetric and unitary groups versus electron correlations in multicentre systems; (ii) conformal symmetries, the Bethe ansatz and quantum groups; (iii) paradoxes of statistics, space–time, and time quantum mechanics. Problems considered in previous schools are merged with some new developments, like statistics with continuous Young diagrams, the existence and structure of energy bands in solids with fullerenes, membranes and some coverings of graphite sheets, or vortex condensates with quantum counterparts of Maxwell lows.
The application of quantum mechanics to information related fields such as communication, computation and cryptography is a fast growing line of research that has been witnessing an outburst of theoretical and experimental results, with possible practical applications. On the one hand, quantum cryptography with its impact on secrecy of transmission is having its first important actual implementations; on the other hand, the recent advances in quantum optics, ion trapping, BEC manipulation, spin and quantum dot technologies allow us to put to direct test a great deal of theoretical ideas and results. These achievements have stimulated a reborn interest in various aspects of quantum mechanics, creating a unique interplay between physics, both theoretical and experimental, mathematics, information theory and computer science. In viewof all these developments, it appeared timely to organize a meeting where graduate students and young researchers could be exposed to the fundamentals of the theory, while senior experts could exchange their latest results. The activity was structured as a school followed by a workshop, and took place at The Abdus Salam International Center for Theoretical Physics (ICTP) and The International School for Advanced Studies (SISSA) in Trieste, Italy, from 12–23 June 2006. The meeting was part of the activity of the Joint European Master Curriculum Development Programme in Quantum Information, Communication, Cryptography and Computation, involving the Universities of Cergy–Pontoise (France), Chania (Greece), Leuven (Belgium), Rennes1 (France) and Trieste (Italy). This special issue of Journal of Physics A: Mathematical and Theoretical collects 22 contributions from well known experts who took part in the workshop. They summarize the present day status of the research in the manifold aspects of quantum information. The issue is opened by two reviewarticles, the first byGAdesso and F Illuminati discussing entanglement in continuous variable systems, the second by T Prosen, discussing chaos and complexity in quantum systems. Both topics have theoretical as well as experimental relevance and are likely to witness a fast growing development in the near future. The remaining contributions present more specific and very recent results. They involve the study of the structure of quantum states and their estimation (B Baumgartner et al, C King et al, S Olivares et al, D Petz et al and W van Dam et al), of entanglement generation and its quantification (G Brida et al, F Ciccarello et al, G Costantini et al, O Romero-Isart et al, D Rossini et al, A Serafini et al and D Vitali et al), of randomness related effects on entanglement behaviour (I Akhalwaya et al, O Dahlsten et al and L Viola et al), and of abstract and applied aspects of quantum computation and communication (K Audenart, G M D'Ariano et al, N Datta et al, L C Kwek et al and M Nathanson et al). We would like to express our gratitude to the European Commission, the Abdus Salam ICTP, SISSA and Eurotech SpA (Amaro, Udine, Italy) for financial and/or logistic support. Special thanks also go to the workshop secretary Marina De Comelli, and the secretaries of the Department of Theoretical Physics, University of Trieste, Sabrina Gaspardis and Rosita Glavina for their precious help and assistance.
The birth of condensed matter physics in Italy is linked to a small number of very distinguished scientists. Mario Tosi, Professor of Physics of Matter at the Scuola Normale Superiore, is unquestionably among the leading figures, a true founder of the theoretical activity in the country and a true catalyst of novel research directions internationally. This volume collects the proceedings of a symposium held at Scuola Normale Superiore di Pisa, designed to show Mario Tosi's broad, deep influence in very diverse areas of the quantum theory of condensed matter. The topics covered in the volume represent the breadth of his interests and the highlights in the quantum theory of condensed matter: liquids, electronic states in complex structures, quantum degenerate gases, many-body physics.
This innovative and modular textbook combines classical topics in thermodynamics, statistical mechanics and many-body theory with the latest developments in condensed matter physics research. Written by internationally renowned experts and logically structured to cater for undergraduate and postgraduate students and researchers, it covers the underlying theoretical principles and includes numerous problems and worked examples to put this knowledge into practice. Three main streams provide a framework for the book; beginning with thermodynamics and classical statistical mechanics, including mean field approximation, fluctuations and the renormalization group approach to critical phenomena. The authors then examine quantum statistical mechanics, covering key topics such as normal Fermi and Luttinger liquids, superfluidity and superconductivity. Finally, they explore classical and quantum kinetics, Anderson localization and quantum interference, and disordered Fermi liquids. Unique in providing a bridge between thermodynamics and advanced topics in condensed matter, this textbook is an invaluable resource to all students of physics.