Classical Dynamics: a Modern Perspective

Classical dynamics is traditionally treated as an early stage in the development of physics, a stage that has long been superseded by more ambitious theories. The authors of this book treat classical dynamics as a subject in its own right as well as a research frontier. Incorporating insights gained over the past several decades, they present the essential principles of classical dynamics and demonstrate that a number of key results originally considered only in the context of quantum theory and particle physics, have their foundations in classical dynamics. Graduate students in physics and practicing physicists will welcome the present approach to classical dynamics that encompasses systems of particles, free and interacting fields, and coupled systems. Lie groups and Lie algebras are incorporated at a basic level and are used in describing space-time symmetry groups. There is an extensive discussion of constrained systems, and on Dirac brackets and their geometrical interpretation. T