Giving an easily accessible elementary introduction to the algebraic theory of quadratic forms, this book covers both Witt's theory and Pfister's theory of quadratic forms. Leading topics include the geometry of bilinear spaces, classification of bilinear spaces up to isometry depending on the ground field, formally real fields, Pfister forms, the Witt ring of an arbitrary field (characteristic two included), prime ideals of the Witt ring, Brauer group of a field, Hasse and Witt invariants of quadratic forms, and equivalence of fields with respect to quadratic forms. Problem sections are included at the end of each chapter. There are two appendices: the first gives a treatment of Hasse and Witt invariants in the language of Steinberg symbols, and the second contains some more advanced problems in 10 groups, including the u-invariant, reduced and stable Witt rings, and Witt equivalence of fields.

Giving an easily accessible elementary introduction to the algebraic theory of quadratic forms, this book covers both Witt's theory and Pfister's theory of quadratic forms. Leading topics include the geometry of bilinear spaces, classification of bilinear spaces up to isometry depending on the ground field, formally real fields, Pfister forms, the Witt ring of an arbitrary field (characteristic two included), prime ideals of the Witt ring, Brauer group of a field, Hasse and Witt invariants of quadratic forms, and equivalence of fields with respect to quadratic forms. Problem sections are included at the end of each chapter. There are two appendices: the first gives a treatment of Hasse and Witt invariants in the language of Steinberg symbols, and the second contains some more advanced problems in 10 groups, including the u-invariant, reduced and stable Witt rings, and Witt equivalence of fields.

The book deals with bilinear forms in real random vectors and their generalizations as well as zonal polynomials and their applications in handling generalized quadratic and bilinear forms. The book is mostly self-contained. It starts from basic principles and brings the readers to the current research level in these areas. It is developed with detailed proofs and illustrative examples for easy readability and self-study. Several exercises are proposed at the end of the chapters. The complicated topic of zonal polynomials is explained in detail in this book. The book concentrates on the theoretical developments in all the topics covered. Some applications are pointed out but no detailed application to any particular field is attempted. This book can be used as a textbook for a one-semester graduate course on quadratic and bilinear forms and/or on zonal polynomials. It is hoped that this book will be a valuable reference source for graduate students and research workers in the areas of mathematical statistics, quadratic and bilinear forms and their generalizations, zonal polynomials, invariant polynomials and related topics, and will benefit statisticians, mathematicians and other theoretical and applied scientists who use any of the above topics in their areas. Chapter 1 gives the preliminaries needed in later chapters, including some Jacobians of matrix transformations. Chapter 2 is devoted to bilinear forms in Gaussian real ran dom vectors, their properties, and techniques specially developed to deal with bilinear forms where the standard methods for handling quadratic forms become complicated.

A comprehensive and modern account of the structure and classification of Lie groups and finite-dimensional Lie algebras, by internationally known specialists in the field. This Encyclopaedia volume will be immensely useful to graduate students in differential geometry, algebra and theoretical physics.

This book is an introduction to a rapidly growing subject of modern mathematics, the Kac-Moody algebra, which was introduced by V Kac and R Moody simultanously and independently in 1968.

The theory cf quadratic forms and the intimately related theory of sym metrie bilinear forms have a lang and rich his tory, highlighted by the work of Legendre, Gauss, Minkowski, and Hasse. (Compare [Dickson] and [Bourbaki, 24, p. 185].) Our exposition will concentrate on the rela tively recent developments which begin with and are inspired by Witt's 1937 paper "Theorie der quadratischen Formen in beliebigen Körpern." We will be particularly interested in the work of A. Pfister and M. Knebusch. However, some older material will be described, particularly in Chapter II. The presentation is based on lectures by Milnor at the Institute for Ad vanced Study, and at Haverford College under the Phillips Lecture Pro gram, during the Fall of 1970, as weIl as Iectures at Princeton University il1 1966. We want to thank J. Cunningham, M. Knebusch, M. Kneser, A. Rosenberg, W. Scharlau and J.-P. Serre for helpful suggestions and corrections. Prerequisites. The reader should be familiar with the rudiments of algebra., incJuding for example the concept of tensor product for mo dules over a commutative ring. A few individual sections will require quite a bit more. The logical relationship between the various chapters can be roughly described by the diagram below. There are also five appendices, largely self-contained, which treat special topics. I. Arbitrary commutative rings I H. The ring of V. Miscellaneous IIl. Fields integers examples IV. Dedekind domains Contents Chapter r. Basie Coneepts ...